THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 


BY  THE   SAME  AUTHOR 

The  Shell  Book 

The  Tree  Book 

Key  to  the  Nature  Library 

Trees  Every  Child  Should  Know 

Earth  and  Sky  Every  Child  Should  Know 

Wild  Animals  Every  Child  Should  Know 


The  cocoanut  palm  is  one  of  the  most  valuable  of 
tropical  fruit  trees 


THE   BOOK 
OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 


BY 

JULIA  ELLEN   ROGERS 
i  ? 


Illustrated  by  thirty-one  pages  of  half-touts 
from  photographs 


GARDEN  CITY  NEW  YORK 

DOUBLEDAY,   PAGE   &   COMPANY 

1913 


65  I 


Copyright,  1913,  fry 

DOUBLEDAY,  PAGE  &  COMPANY 

All  rights  reserved,  including  that  of 

translation  into  foreign  languages, 

including  the  Scandinavian 


.;/** 

-1  V 


**  i  I  *  *3  *«;  •?  i  -5  $  :  4»*     : 
'  *«.»?»»*%• 


To 
THE  LIVELY  TRIO, 

MALCOLM,    DAN,  AND  MARY   ELIZABETH, 

THIS    BOOK   IS   AFFECTIONATELY 

INSCRIBED 


3402I 


PREFACE 

The  world  of  plants  is  a  wonder  world  to  chil- 
dren. The. growing  of  a  plant,  from  seed  to  seed, 
is  a  wonderful  experience.  The  wheat  that  makes 
our  bread  can  trace  its  family  line  back  to  the 
time  when  men  lived  in  caves  and  were  wild  as 
the  beasts  with  whom  they  contended  without 
weapons.  Grains  and  other  plants  that  have 
ministered  for  centuries  to  the  comfort  and  happi- 
ness of  the  race  have  long,  interesting  histories. 
A  wonderful  future  lies  before  each  one.  We 
need  but  an  introduction.  Their  stories  grip  our 
interest. 

Boys  and  girls  are  learning  to  know  and  to 
grow  plants.  The  New  Agriculture  has  a  place 
for  each  one  of  them.  To  be  ready,  they  must 
learn  all  they  can  about  plants.  To  help  them  to 
wider  knowledge  is  the  author's  reason  for  writing 
this  book. 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 
BREAD  PLANTS 

PAGE 

RICE        3 

WHEAT 14 

OATS 27 

RYE 31 

BARLEY 34 

CORN 36 

THE  WONDERFUL  MAIZE  PLANT 46 

KAFIR  AND  DURRA 51 

MILLETS 53 

BUCKWHEAT 55 

BREAD-FRUIT 56 

ARROWROOT  PLANTS 59 

SAGO  PALM           62 

FORAGE  PLANTS 

GRASSES 67 

CLOVERS 68 

ALFALFA 72 

SUGAR  PLANTS 

SUGAR-CANE 79 

SORGHUM 84 

SUGAR  BEETS 85 

SUGAR  MAPLES 88 

PLANTS  WHOSE  SEEDS  WE  EAT 

BEANS 93 

PEAS 95 

ix 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 

PLANTS  WHOSE  SEEDS  WE  EAT  — Continued 

PAGE 

LENTILS  .' 97 

PEANUTS 98 

ALMONDS        . 104 

AMERICAN  WALNUTS IO6 

ENGLISH  WALNUTS IO8 

HICKORIES     .       . Ill 

CHESTNUTS 112 

BEECHES.       .       .       .   '- 114 

OTHER  NUTS   OF  COMMERCE Il6 

PLANTS  WHOSE  LEAVES  AND  STEMS  WE  EAT 

LETTUCE 121 

ENDIVE 124 

DANDELION 12$ 

GLOBE  ARTICHOKE          .........  126 

SPINACH 128 

ASPARAGUS I2p 

SWISS  CHARD 130 

CRESSES 131 

CELERY 133 

PARSLEY ,       ...  137 

SEA-KALE 138 

FENNEL           139 

CHERVIL »,....  141 

DILL 141 

THE  WILD  CABBAGE  AND  ITS  CHILDREN        .       .  142 

THE   ONION  FAMILY 150 

RHUBARB,   OR  PIE-PLANT 154 

PLANTS  WHOSE  ROOTS  AND  TUBERS  WE  EAT 

THE   GARDEN  BEET  AND  ITS  KIN         .       .       .       .  159 

RADISHES 162 

HORSE  RADISH .       .  164 

TURNIPS 165 

CHICORY         .       .       ,       .       .       .      ';  "  •      .       ,       .  l68 

x 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 

PLANTS  WHOSE  ROOTS  AND  TUBERS  WE  EAT 

—  Continued  PAOE 

SALSIFY 172 

JERUSALEM  ARTICHOKE 174 

PARSNIPS      .     .    J.  ;.. 176 

CARROTS 177 

POTATOES l8o 

SWEET  POTATOES l88 

PLANTS  WHOSE  SEED  VESSELS  WE  EAT 

THE  ORANGE  AND  ITS  KIN 19$ 

GRAPES 201 

CORE   FRUITS 2o6 

APPLES 207 

PEARS 210 

QUINCES 211 

MEDLARS 212 

LOQUATS 213 

STONE  FRUITS 213 

PLUMS 213 

PEACHES 214 

APRICOTS 2l6 

CHERRIES 217 

CANE  FRUITS 2l8 

BUSH  FRUITS 22O 

TWO  FINE  WILD  BERRIES 22O 

STRAWBERRIES  222 

PINEAPPLES 226 

FIGS 230 

BANANAS 237 

MELONS  241 

SQUASHES  AND  PUMPKINS 246 

OLIVES 249 

TOMATOES 253 

EGG-PLANTS 256 

RED  PEPPERS 258 

CUCUMBERS 260 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 

BEVERAGE  PLANTS 

PAGE 

CACAO       .......       ....       .  267 

TEA .       .       .  273 

COFFEE    .       .     -.       .       .       .       .....       .  279 

MATE,   OR  PARAGUAY  TEA.       .       .       .       .       .       .  287 

PULQUE           .       ...       .       .       .       .       ,       .       .  288 

NARCOTIC  PLANTS 

TOBACCO.       .       .       .       .       ....      ...'-,   .       .  291 

POPPY       .       .       .       .       .       .       .       .       .       .       .       .  296 

BETEL-NUT    .       .      '.       .       .       .       .       ....  297 

COCA 298 

FIBRE  PLANTS 

FLAX *      .       .  303 

COTTON .  310 

HEMP ".       .       .       .  321. 

OTHER  CORDAGE   FIBRES     .       .       .       .       .       .       .  325 

BROOM  CORN .       .       .  327 

PLANTS  THAT  SERVE  MANY  OR  SPECIAL 
PURPOSES 

BAMBOOS 333 

PALMS 335 

HOPS .  344 

RAPE 347 

FULLER'S  TEASEL 349 

RUBBER  PLANTS 352 

GUTTA  PERCHA 362 

MUSHROOMS 364 


xii 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

The  Coco-nut  Palm Frontispiece 

FACING  PAGE 

A  Good  Variety  of  Beardless  Wheat 16 

Kiushiu  Rice 16 

Honduras  and  Carolina  Varieties  of  Rice 16 

A  Field  of  Oats 17 

Fine  Barley  Growing  in  an  Irrigated  Mountain  Valley  17 

This  Boy  Grew  239  Bushels  of  Corn  on  an  Acre      .  32 

A  Field  of  Buckwheat  in  Bloom 33 

The  Loaf  that  Hangs  on  the  Bread-fruit  Tree  is  as  Large 

as  a  Man's  Head 80 

Cultivating  Sugar-cane  by  Machinery  in  the  South  .  81 
Enlarging  the  Holes  to  Strengthen  the  Flow  of  Sap  from 

the  Maple  Trees 96 

Garden  Peas 97 

A  Thrifty  Peanut  Field  in  North  Carolina      .      . '    .  128 

A  Single  Peanut  Plant  and  Its  Nuts 128 

Asparagus  in  Bundles 129 

The  Savoy  Cabbage 144 

Cauliflower,  the  Most  Delicate  Vegetable  in  the  Cab- 
bage Family •  *45 

Kohlrabi,  the  Turnip-like  Vegetable,  Related  to  the 

Cabbage 145 

A  Line  of  Samples  from  a  Schoolboy's  Home  Garden  160 
Corn,  Parsley,  Carrots,  Wax  and  Lima  Beans,  Cucum- 
bers, and  Tomatoes 161 

A  Fine  Hill  of  Sweet  Potatoes 176 

Garden  Beets *77 

xiii 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

FACING  PAGE 

A  Great  Variety  of  Delicious  Dishes  are  Made  Out  of  the 

Homely  Squash    .     ..'•*"»'.     .     .-.     .     ...    .     .  177 

The  Growth  and  Yield  of  a  Grapevine  is  a  Miracle  Re- 
peated Each  Year     .     ,     .     ,     ,     r  .  ,     .     .  •    .  208 
Blackcap  Raspberries    .      ...»•..     .     ,     .  209 

The  Banana  Plant .,.     »     .,    .  224 

Nobody  is  Unhappy  Here  But  the  Dog    ....  225 

Thanksgiving  Day  is  Almost  Here! 256 

Olives  are  Bitter  as  Gall  Until  Pickled       ....  257 

Opening  the  Pods  to  Take  Out  the  Cocoa  Beans     .  272 
The  Sweet  Water  of  This  Century  Plant  is  Good  to 

Drink 273 

Tobacco  is  a  Stately  and  Beautiful  Plant       .     .     .320 

Harvest  Time  in  the  Cotton  Fields 321 

The  Oriental  Bamboo 336 

California-grown  Dates  .          337 

A  Young  Rubber  Tree 352 

The  Pink-gilled  Meadow  Mushroom 353 


Bread  Plants 


THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

CHAPTER  I 
RICE 

A  YELLOW  field  that  waves  like  wheat,  but  at 
nearer  view  looks  more  like  oats,  comes  to 
harvest,  sometimes  twice  a  year,  in  the  warm 
countries  of  the  globe,  especially  in  the  regions 
near  the  sea.  This  is  the  rice  crop,  that  feeds 
nearly  half  of  the  human  race.  Rice  does  well 
even  with  poor  tillage,  on  poor  soil;  and  better 
when  given  the  careful  culture  that  a  good 
farmer  puts  upon  a  "money  crop,"  one  he  grows 
to  sell. 

The  rice  plant  is  a  grass,  with  long,  narrow 
leaves,  and  wiry  stems  from  two  to  five  feet  high. 
In  India  and  Australia  wild  rice  is  found  growing 
to-day  on  the  edges  of  marshy  sloughs  and  along 
rivers.  From  these  wild  grasses  the  natives 
gathered  the  seeds  with  care  thousands  of  years 
ago,  and,  gradually,  to  the  wild  supply  was  added 
the  harvest  of  patches  sown  with  the  gathered 

3 


4  ^B2    BOOK    OF  USEFUL    PLANTS 


seed  and  improved  by  cultivation.  Other  regions 
got  the  seed,  and  so  the  crop  spread  eastward 
through  what  is  now  the  great  Chinese  Empire, 
Japan,  Siam,  and  the  islands  between  India  and 
Australia. 

The  culture  of  rice  in  the  valley  of  the  Euphrates 
was  described  by  historians  who  wrote  centuries 
before  the  Christian  Era.  Rice  is  mentioned  in 
the  Talmud.  The  Moors  established  it  in  Spain. 
It  was  grown  on  both  sides  of  the  Mediterranean 
Sea;  with  especial  success  in  Italy.  The  boy 
Columbus  might  have  seen  thousands  of  acres 
of  rice  growing  in  the  marshy  lands  about  Genoa 
and  Pisa,  as  he  wandered  about,  dreaming  of  that 
far-off  India  he  hoped  to  reach  by  a  new  route. 
His  expeditions  opened  the  way  for  the  rice 
industry  in  Mexico  and  Central  America.  In 
1647  the  English  attempted  to  grow  rice  in  the 
swamps  owned  by  the  Virginia  Colony,  but 
that  was  out  of  its  natural  habitat  —  too  far 
north. 

The  introduction  of  rice  into  the  South  was 
an  accident,  though  it  must  surely  have  come. 
In  1694  a  sailing  vessel,  bound  for  England  from 
Madagascar,  encountered  a  gale  off  the  coast  of 
South  Carolina  and  was  obliged  to  put  into  the 
port  of  Charleston  for  repairs,  Here  the  captain 


BREAD    PLANTS  5 

found  the  Governor  to  be  an  old  acquaintance. 
During  their  exchange  of  visits  a  bag  of  rice  was 
brought  ashore,  and  the  Governor  had  it  sown 
on  a  piece  of  swampy  land  he  owned.  The  crop 
was  a  good  one,  and  the  planters  of  the  neighbour- 
hood went  enthusiastically  into  rice  culture. 
A  dozen  years  later  seventeen  shiploads  of  rice 
left  the  port  for  England  —  the  beginning  of  our 
export  trade  in  this  grain. 

The  Carolinas,  Louisiana,  and  (lately)  Texas, 
are  the  rice-growing  states.  Japan,  Hawaii,  and 
Mexico  ship  rice  to  American  markets.  The 
spread  of  rice  culture  was  rapid  under  the  slavery 
system  in  the  South,  but  the  Civil  War  almost 
ruined  it.  Slowly  and  steadily  it  has  revived, 
and  now  is  a  great  and  growing  agricultural  in- 
dustry. 

The  centuries  of  cultivation  have  developed 
many  kinds  of  rice  adapted  to  different  soils, 
different  regions,  different  modes  of  culture. 
Over  two  thousand  varieties  are  listed.  No 
other  grain  has  as  many.  If  no  other  record 
existed  to  prove  the  antiquity  of  the  domestication 
of  the  wild  species,  the  multitude  of  varieties  would 
be  proof  enough.  Most  of  them  must  be  grown 
on  level  fields  that  can  be  flooded.  But  there  are 
varieties  that  need  the  same  treatment  as  wheat. 


O         THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

These  are  called  "  upland,"  or  "hill"  rice.  The 
"wet"  rice  includes  all  the  varieties  that  must 
have  water  about  the  roots,  or  they  die  of  thirst. 

The  famous  "Carolina  gold"  variety  was  de- 
veloped by  a  planter  who  went  into  his  fields  at 
harvest  time  and  selected  for  seed  the  best  heads 
with  the  longest  kernels  he  could  find.  Year  after 
year  he  persevered.  The  variety  was  thus  "fixed." 
Many  great  plantations  of  the  Far  East  send 
to  the  Carolinas  for  seed,  rather  than  grow  the 
short-grained  native  sorts,  for  the  Carolina  rice 
greatly  increases  the  yield.  Japan  has  a  famous 
rice  called  Kiushiu,  in  great  demand  for  seed  in 
other  countries.  Its  kernel  is  short  and  broad, 
and  does  not  break  in  the  mill  as  does  the  long- 
grained  rice. 

The  Chinese  Empire  has  a  tremendous  popu- 
lation, but  few  large  cities.  The  people  are 
thickly  distributed  over  the  country,  where  they 
live  on  what  can  be  raised  on  little  farms  —  we 
would  call  them  mere  patches  of  land.  The 
failure  of  crops  means  famine.  Rice  is  the  princi- 
pal crop.  No  wonder  the  wise  Emperor,  Chin- 
nong,  in  the  year  2800  B.C.,  established  the 
annual  ceremonial  of  the  sowing  of  the  "five  holy 
plants, "  that  the  people  should  keep  in  mind  that 
these  stood  always  between  them  and  famine. 


BREAD    PLANTS  7 

A  field  attached  to  the  Temple  of  Earth  and 
Heaven,  at  Peking,  is  worked  into  perfect  condition 
in  anticipation  of  the  ceremony.  The  "Son  of 
Heaven,"  as  the  Emperor  is  called,  plows  four 
furrows,  with  a  wonderfully  ornamented  plow, 
kept  in  the  temple  for  this  purpose.  Then  the 
princes,  the  high  dignitaries,  and  the  court  atten- 
dants, down  the  scale  of  rank,  take  turns  at  the 
plow.  Forty  laborers,  deserving  of  the  honor, 
are  allowed  to  finish  the  task  of  preparation. 
Then  the  Emperor  sows  the  rice,  himself;  princes 
sow  millet,  wheat,  barley  and  beans.  These 
grains  are  tended  with  especial  care  as  they  grow, 
and  harvested  by  officials  of  high  rank.  The 
crops  of  each  grain  are  stored  in  the  temple,  and 
used  on  special  occasions  in  making  offerings  to 
the  spirits  of  the  dead  ancestors  of  the  ruling 
Emperor. 

Viceroys  in  the  outlying  provinces  of  the  Empire 
enact  the  same  ceremony,  so  the  people  are  all 
reached  by  its  influence. 

China's  population  of  40x3,000,000  is  more  than 
five  times  that  of  the  United  States.  In  spite  of 
all  efforts,  the  people  cannot  raise  all  the  rice  they 
need.  The  exportation  of  this  grain  has  for 
centuries  been  forbidden.  Little  Japan,  with 
50,000,000  population,  exports  quantities  yearly. 


8        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

The  United  States  uses  twice  as  much  rice  each 
year  as  it  produces. 

RICE   FARMING 

Rice  culture  in  the  United  States  is  usually 
carried  on  in  the  most  up-to-date  manner,  with 
improved,  labor-saving  machinery.  The  fields 
must  be  level,  the  soil  a  clay  loam,  with  stiff  clay 
under  it  to  hold  the  water,  and  later  to  support 
the  heavy  harvester.  Reclaimed  swamps  and 
the  flats  subject  to  floods  along  river  courses  were 
the  first  rice  lands  of  the  South.  The  fields  must 
be  surrounded  by  levees,  or  dykes,  to  regulate 
the  water  supply.  After  the  grain  is  drilled  in  and 
has  sprouted,  the  water  is  let  in  by  raising  the 
gates,  and  kept  rising  as  the  stems  lengthen.  The 
grass  and  weeds  are  mostly  drowned  out,  but  the 
water  is  drained  off  to  allow  the  plants  to  get  one 
good  hoeing.  After  this,  the  water  is  admitted 
again,  and  it  keeps  rising  until  flowering  time. 
The  rice  plant  heads  like  oats,  in  a  branching 
cluster  of  single  flowers.  The  one  grain  in  a  spike- 
let,  is  enclosed  in  two  tight  glumes,  one  carry- 
ing the  long  awn,  if  it  is  a  bearded  variety.  Ex- 
amine any  bag  of  rice,  and  you  can  find  a  grain 
still  in  the  glumes,  that  we  call  the  "hull." 


BREAD    PLANTS  9 

The  water  supply  is  often  many  feet  lower  than 
the  rice  field.  Pumps  are  used  to  bring  it  up,  or 
it  may  be  elevated  by  the  principle  of  the  siphon, 
a  method  that  saves  power  generated  by  engines. 
Deep  wells  supply  water  to  the  irrigating  ditches 
in  some  rice-growing  sections  of  the  Southwest. 
This  allows  tracts  far  removed  from  river  courses 
to  come  under  this  form  of  agriculture. 

Before  the  field  turns  yellow,  the  land  is  drained, 
and  the  reapers  and  binders  cut  and  bind  the 
,grain,  which  is  shocked,  then  stacked  for  later 
threshing.  The  use  of  machinery  greatly  reduces 
the  need  of  hand  labor,  which  is  far  more  ex- 
pensive in  this  country  than  in  the  Tropics  and 
the  Far  East. 

The  methods  of  growing  rice  have  changed 
little  since  the  beginning  of  its  cultivation  in 
China  and  India.  The  plow  is  most  primitive, 
often  little  more  than  a  crooked  pole,  with  its  nose 
in  the  mud,  dragged  along  by  a  stupid  water 
buffalo. 

The  preparation  of  the  field  is  often  only  the 
stirring  up  of  the  mud  at  the  bottom  of  a  shallow 
swamp,  obstructed  by  tree  roots  and  rubbish. 
The  seed  bed  is  a  level  patch,  better  prepared. 
The  seed  is  sown  broadcast,  often  sprouted  before- 
hand. When  the  shoots  are  three  inches  high  the 


IO        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

bed  is  flooded  daily  to  saturate  the  ground,  then 
the  water  is  allowed  to  drain  off.  When  the  plants 
reach  six  inches  in  height  they  are  transplanted 
into  the  mud  of  the  field,  thirty  times  the  size  of 
the  seed  bed.  The  work  is  done  very  rapidly, 
oftenest  by  women,  the  plants  being  set  at  a 
distance  of  six  inches  apart  in  rows  about  eight 
inches  apart. 

The  plants  are  kept  under  water  until  they  are 
about  fifteen  inches  high.  Then  they  are  drained 
and  weeded,  or  hoed.  The  water  is  then  let  in 
again,  and  remains  until  the  harvest  is  almost  due. 
The  heads  droop  with  the  weight  of  the  kernels, 
and  if  they  ripen  before  being  gathered,  much 
grain  is  lost. 

The  harvester  goes  to  his  work  with  a  reaping 
hook  in  his  hand,  lays  the  handfuls  on  the  stubble 
to  dry.  Later  the  grain  is  threshed  by  the  slow 
and  wasteful  method  of  treading  it  out  by  driving 
oxen  over  the  straw,  spread  on  a  smooth  piece  of 
ground,  or  on  a  barn  floor.  Men  tread  it  out 
often.  Much  is  lost  and  damaged  by  this  clumsy 
method. 

Sometimes  handfuls  of  straw  are  whipped  over 
a  sharp  stone,  or  drawn  through  narrow  slits,  to 
comb  off  the  kernels.  This  is  slow,  but  it  saves 
the  rice  in  good  condition.  In  its  snug  yellow 


BREAD    PLANTS  II 

husks  the  grain  is  called  "paddy. "  It  is  ready  for 
the  milling  process,  or  to  be  stored  for  months, 
or  shipped  to  near  or  distant  markets. 

There  are  various  simple  methods  of  pounding 
the  paddy  to  get  the  hull  off  of  the  white  grain. 
Stone  mortars  and  pestles  are  used  in  different 
countries,  and  a  vast  amount  of  muscular  energy 
expended  in  pounding  large  or  small  quantities, 
until  all  the  hulls  are  off.  The  Chinese  family 
has  a  daily  job  of  pounding  just  enough  paddy 
for  the  day's  use.  Children  often  do  this  work, 
using  mallets  of  wood. 

Then  comes  the  winnowing  process.  The 
grain  is  lifted  high  and  poured  out  of  shovel-like 
baskets.  The  heavy  grain  drops  to  the  ground. 
The  light  chaff  drifts  away  a  little  distance  as  it 
falls. 

It  is  easy  to  find  rice  imported  from  Japan  in 
any  large  city  market.  It  comes  in  bags  woven 
of  rice  straw,  that  resembles  tea  matting. 

Rice  is  deficient  in  oils  and  proteid  matter,  but 
rich  in  starch.  It  needs  eggs  or  meat  to  make 
a  balanced  diet  for  us.  That  is  because  we  are 
not  vegetarians,  as  the  average  oriental  is.  He 
thrives  on  rice,  with  beans  to  supply  the  elements 
we  get  from  meat.  But  he  eats  the  whole  rice, 
and  so  gets  the  richest  part  of  the  grain,  which 


12       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

American  rice  mills  sacrifice  in  order  to  get  a  white, 
polished  grain. 

In  the  American  mills,  rice  is  first  received  as 
paddy  from  the  threshing.  It  is  cleaned  of  weed 
seed,  then  hulled,  then  winnowed,  then  ground 
to  remove  the  bran,  and  rubbed  between  sheep- 
skin buffers  to  polish  the  grain.  Now  the  sift- 
ing process  takes  out  the  broken  grains  and 
the  starchy  dust,  and  the  grain  is  graded  for 
market. 

Our  rice  is  white,  but  tasteless  when  cooked. 
"Brown  rice"  is  rich  in  flavor,  and  has  a  creamy 
color.  Those  who  taste  rice  in  Japan,  or  cooked 
in  the  Japanese  way  here,  do  not  wonder  that  the 
little  brown  men  were  able  to  defeat  men  and  arm- 
ies much  larger  than  their  own,  and  to  keep  well 
and  strong  on  a  diet  of  rice. 

Some  American  grocers  carry  a  limited  quan- 
tity of  "brown  rice,"  the  paddy  with  hulls  re- 
moved. 

Fermented  rice  is  the  basis  of  the  national 
beverage,  called  sake,  which  the  Japanese  drink 
hot  out  of  tiny  porcelain  cups  at  the  beginning 
of  a  meal.  At  weddings  a  good  deal  of  sake  is 
drunk,  and  as  it  contains  a  high  percentage  of 
alcohol,  the  people  may  become  intoxicated. 
The  Chinese  and  the  natives  of  different  East 


BREAD   PLANTS  13 

Indian  islands  have  their  own  beverages  made  of 
fermented  rice. 

Europe  imports  great  quantities  of  rice  for 
food,  and  for  the  manufacture  of  starch.  Calicoes 
are  stiffened  with  a  paste  of  rice  powder.  Broken 
rice,  the  dust  from  rice  mills,  and  the  straw  and 
hulls  all  make  good  food  for  cattle.  The  straw 
is  used  in  making  bags,  hats,  shoes,  and  other 
wearing  apparel.  Plowed  under,  the  stubble  en- 
riches the  soil. 

Not  only  is  rice  the  greatest  grain  crop  of  the 
world;  it  is  one  of  the  most  beautiful  of  cereals 
as  it  grows  on  hillsides  in  Japan.  The  brooks 
that  flow  down  the  mountainsides  are  tapped  by 
side  channels  that  lead  the  water  onto  wonderful 
flat  terraces,  all  planted  to  rice.  Step  by  step 
the  water  trickles  down,  each  little  patch  watered, 
and  giving  the  water  again  to  the  level  next  below 
it.  Constantly  the  supply  is  renewed  from  above. 
The  trees  form  lovely  frames  for  the  pictures  as 
the  grain  turns  from  green  to  gold,  and  the  widen- 
ing brook  finally  pours  its  waters  into  the  marsh 
that  is  a  broad,  level  sea  of  rice,  ready  for  the 
sickle.  In  September  the  golden  ricelands  are  as 
beautiful  as  the  orchards  and  gardens  that  burst 
into  bloom  in  cherry  blossom  time,  the  month  of 
May. 


14  THE   BOOK  OF   USEFUL  PLANTS 

WHEAT 

Let  us  look  first  at  a  single  grain  of  wheat,  out 
of  the  bagful  the  farmer  is  about  to  sow,  or  the 
miller  is  about  to  pour  into  the  hopper,  to  grind 
into  flour.  It  is  an  oval  body  with  a  deep  crease 
running  lengthwise  on  one  side,  a  tuft  of  fine  hairs 
at  the  tip,  and  the  chit,  or  embryo,  at  the  base,  and 
directly  opposite  to  the  groove.  From  this  chit 
the  wheat  plant  rises.  Stored  under  the  protect- 
ing coats  of  the  grain  are  the  food  elements  that 
are  to  nourish  the  little  plant  until  its  own  leaves 
and  roots  are  able  to  support  it  independently. 
The  baby  plant  and  its  lunch  basket  are  wrapped 
up  in  the  grain  we  are  looking  at. 

Without  a  microscope  it  will  be  difficult  for  us 
to  make  out  the  various  coats  that  wrap  the  store 
of  starch  that  forms  93  per  cent,  of  the  kernel's 
bulk.  Six  per  cent,  of  it  is  the  embryo,  with  its 
shield  that  protects  and  absorbs  food  for  the 
minute  plantlet,  whose  root  and  stem  are  visible 
when  the  grain  is  soaked.  The  seed  wrappings 
form  the  remaining  I  per  cent,  of  the  whole. 

A  thin  skin,  the  epidermis,  covers  the  grain. 
Four  coats  under  the  skin  compose  the  bran,  the 
third  from  the  outside  being  the  coloring  matter 
which  gives  the  brown  tinge  to  whole  wheat  flour. 


BREAD    PLANTS  15 

Under  the  bran  layers  is  a  layer  of  gluten,  that 
envelops  the  central  body  of  starch  and  the  chit, 
and  weighs  8  per  cent,  of  the  grain.  This  is  the 
part  that  is  sticky;  because  of  its  presence  in  wheat 
flour  we  are  able  to  have  spongy  bread,  "risen" 
with  yeast. 

"Light"  bread  that  is  also  white  bread,  is  so 
commonly  used  by  nations  of  the  highest  civiliza- 
tion that  an  American  must  travel  widely  in  order 
to  realize  that  in  many  countries  it  is  a  luxury 
enjoyed  by  few.  Other  grains  form  the  staff  of 
life,  and  bread  is  not  white.  One  of  the  distinc- 
tions of  the  United  States  is  the  fact  that  it  raises 
more  wheat  than  any  other  country,  and  the  poor- 
est families  eat  white  bread  as  regularly  as  their 
rich  neighbors. 

WHEAT    FARMING 

The  farmer  sows  his  wheat  broadcast,  by  hand, 
if  he  is  old-fashioned  and  skilful,  and  has  a 
small  field;  otherwise  with  some  kind  of  drill,  or 
seeder,  that  plants  a  large  area  more  evenly  and 
more  quickly  that  can  be  done  by  hand.  The 
ground  must  be  a  deep,  well-drained,  rich,  clay 
loam,  mellow  and  free  from  weeds,  if  a  good  crop 
is  to  follow.  Next  to  the  sowing  comes  the  har- 


16       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

rowing,  unless  the  seeding  is  done  by  a  press  drill, 
that  puts  the  grains  underground  at  least  an  inch. 
The  harrow  kills  weeds,  breaks  up  the  surface 
crust  and  covers  the  seed.  The  newest  tool,  the 
press  drill,  does  all  these  operations  at  once:  seed- 
ing, covering,  and  smoothing  the  bare  ground  over 
the  seed. 

If  weather  is  fair  and  warm,  the  wheat  field 
shows  its  green  spears  at  the  end  of  the  second 
week  after  sowing.  Soon  the  bare  ground  has 
turned  green  as  a  lawn.  One  long  leaf  at  each 
joint  of  the  stem  is  the  rule  with  the  wheat  plant, 
and  that  leaf  in  two  sections :  the  lower  half  clasps 
the  stalk;  the  upper  half  extends  outward,  expos- 
ing its  flat  surface  to  the  sun.  This  is  the  part 
that  waves  in  the  breezes.  Many  people  would 
overlook  the  tubular  part  that  strengthens  the 
stalk,  and  only  serves  its  leaf  function  by  exposing 
the  green  under  surface  to  the  sun.  When  wind 
lashes  the  standing  grain  the  leaves  swing  around 
without  breaking,  because  the  basal  half  of  each 
is  tough-fibred  and  takes  a  spiral  twist  around  the 
stem.  This  saves  the  leaves  in  many  a  storm  from 
being  whipped  off. 

The  swollen  joints,  too,  save  the  wheat  that 
gets  "lodged"  by  wind.  Strangely  enough,  the 
swelling  of  the  base  of  the  leaf-sheath  on  the  side 


A  good  variety  of  beardless  wheat 


S?£13H 

P£3M  ^ 

I 


Honduras  and  Carolina  varie-      Kiushiu  rice  has  short  kernels 
ties  of  rice  have  long  that  do  not  break  badly  in 

kernels  milling 


Rarely  does  a  field  of  oats  stand  as  high  as  the  farmer 


Fine  barley  grows  in  these  irrigated  mountain  valleys 


BREAD    PLANTS  If 

that  has  bent  over  lifts  the  stem  toward  the  erect 
position.  All  the  leaf  bases  help,  and  the  plant 
soon  stands  vertical  again.  These  bases  remain 
soft  even  when  the  leaf  is  getting  yellow.  The 
effort  to  lift  fallen  grain  is  not  so  successful,  after 
the  stalks  are  ripe. 

One  of  the  peculiar  habits  of  the  wheat  plant  is 
"tillering."  The  stem  that  first  comes  up  from 
each  grain  of  seed  that  sprouts  is  quickly  joined 
by  shoots  that  rise  from  joints  underground. 

Three  main  roots  strike  downward,  from  the' 
chit  as  the  plumule,  or  stem,  shoots  upward  toward 
the  light.  But  the  "crown"  of  the  wheat 
plant  is  higher  than  the  seed,  which  is  not  lifted  up 
in  sprouting,  as  beans  are.  A  group  of  much 
stronger  roots  strike  down  from  the  first  joints  of 
the  parent  stem,  and  the  "tillers, "or  secondary 
stems,  rise  around  their  parent,  forming  a  "stool. " 
The  thinner  the  sowing,  the  better  chance  for  these 
side  shoots  to  multiply;  and  the  deeper  the  grain 
is  planted,  the  more  joints  of  the  original  stem 
will  be  covered  with  soil  and  able  to  "stool," 
sending  roots  down  and  stems  up. 

The  best  wheat  plant  is  the  one  with  the  greatest 
number  of  strong  stalks.  In  the  average  field 
the  number  of  stalks  from  a  single  seed  is  from  six 
to  twelve.  Exceptional  plants  have  three  to  four 


18        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

dozen  stalks.  The  plants  from  feeble  seed  may 
have  but  two  or  three  feeble  stalks.  So  the 
farmer  who  sows  poor  seed  is  wasting  time  and 
labor. 

When  the  wheat  stalks  are  full-grown  they 
blossom  in  long  spikes  or  heads,  made  up  of  "spike- 
lets"  (side  branches),  each  with  a  few  flowers,  and 
enclosed  in  papery  coverings,  called  outer  glumes. 
These  glumes  are  set  alternately  upon  the  stem. 
Each  pair  of  glumes  opens  at  flowering  time, 
exposing  one  to  four  pairs  of  smaller,  more  delicate 
glumes  each  one  a  wheat  blossom  in  the  bud.  The 
smaller  glume  is  the  palet;  it  lies  next  to  the  stem. 
The  larger  one  may  have  a  long,  rough  spine  that 
protrudes  an  inch  or  more.  Such  wheat  is  a 
"bearded"  variety.  Between  the  palet  and  this 
outer  flowering  glume  is  the  ovary,  containing  the 
plump  ovule,  with  two  plume-like  branches  of  the 
stigma  held  above  it.  On  the  sides  stand  the  three 
stamens,  that  hang  out  their  large  anthers  on 
slender  filaments  when  the  glumes  part  for  the 
wind  to  do  its  work  of  carrying  pollen  from  open- 
ing anthers  to  waiting  stigmas.  To  some  extent, 
wheat  flowers  are  pollenated  within  the  bud. 
But  the  wind  does  the  cross-pollenating,  which 
makes  more  vigorous,  larger  grains  than  self- 
pollenation. 


BREAD    PLANTS  ig 

A  "head"  of  wheat,  three  or  four  inches  long, 
may  have  fifteen  to  twenty  spikelets  filled  out,  and 
a  few  that  failed  and  dried  away.  Each  spikelet 
had  from  one  to  four  flowers;  so  two  or  three  grains 
of  wheat  may 'be  the  average  in  each  spikelet. 
Counting  them  all,  the  head  may  yield  thirty  to 
fifty  grains  of  wheat.  Now  count  the  heads 
borne  by  the  single  plant,  and  how  many  grains 
are  the  harvest  of  a  single  seed  sowed?  Three 
or  four  hundred  grains  are  possible,  but  not 
usual. 

Five  pecks  to  an  acre  is  the  average  amount  of 
wheat  sown  in  the  United  States.  "In  ten  years, 
one  grain  of  North  Dakota  wheat  produced 
300,000  bushels."  The  average  yield  per  acre 
in  the  United  States  is  about  thirteen  bushels. 
In  the  Northwest,  sixty  and  seventy  bushels  an 
acre  are  not  uncommon.  A  thousand-acre  field 
that  yielded  51,000  bushels  holds  the  record 
for  a  field  of  that  size.  Germany  and  England 
average  more  than  twice  the  yield  of  American 
wheat  fields.  Older  fields,  but  better  tillage 
and  more  fertilizers  put  upon  the  land,  make 
the  difference.  Better  farming  is  increasing  the 
yield  of  crops,  but  wheat  farming  has  been  one 
of  the  worst  robbers  of  the  virgin  soil  of  our 
country. 


20       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 
THE  WHEAT  HARVEST 

When  wheat  begins  to  turn  yellow,  the  time  of 
harvest  is  near.  The  farmer  dents  a  kernel  with 
his  thumb  nail.  If  it  does  not  burst,  it  is  ready  for 
the  sickle.  The  best  flour  is  made  from  wheat 
that  is  dead  ripe  when  harvested.  But  it  is  not 
possible  to  get  a  large  field  cut  at  just  the  best  time. 
So  it  is  usual  to  begin  the  reaping  before  the  grain 
is  quite  ripe,  trusting  to  the  after  care  to  offset  the 
disadvantages  of  cutting  it  under-ripe.  If  over- 
ripe the  standing  grain  is  attacked  by  birds,  the 
wind  breaks  the  brittle  stalks,  and  shells  out  the 
loose  grain.  Rainy  weather  fades  the  color  of  the 
kernels  and  sets  them  to  sprouting.  A  few  days' 
delay  at  harvest  time  may  lose  the  farmer  half  the 
value  of  his  entire  wheat  crop.  In  regions  of 
little  or  no  summer  rain,  the  harvest  hurry  is  not 
so  great. 

The  first  harvesting  tool  was  the  hand  sickle, 
some  form  of  knife  that  gathered  and  cut  off  a 
bundle  of  straws  as  they  grew.  Before  the  sickle 
was  invented,  the  wheat  was  pulled  up  in  handfuls 
as  flax  is  pulled  to-day.  After  the  sickle  came 
scythes,  and  then  the  "cradle,"  swung  by  both 
hands,  and  followed  by  a  man  who  bound  the 
grain.  Expert  cradlers  cut  three  and  four  acres 


BREAD    PLANTS  21 

of  wheat  a  day.  Then  came  a  procession  of  im- 
proved machinery  aimed  to  replace  human  muscle 
with  some  other  power,  used  by  a  machine  that 
does  its  work  quicker  and  better  than  the  man 
with  the  cradle; 

Headers  pushed  through  the  grain,  stripping 
the  heads  by  means  of  a  coarse  comb  set  on  the 
edge  of  a  cart,  were  used  in  Gaul  at  the  beginning 
of  the  Christian  Era.  The  power  was  furnished 
by  an  ox  hitched  between  shafts  at  the  back  of  the 
cart.  The  driver  raked  the  heads  off  of  the  knives 
into  the  cart.  This  machine  was  in  use  for  cen- 
turies. Then  it  was  abandoned  and  forgotten 
for  centuries  more* 

The  publishing  of  an  account  of  this  machine, 
described  by  Pliny  in  70  A.  D.,  led  to  the  inven- 
tion of  the  reaper  with  revolving  reel;  and  finally 
came  the  combined  reaper  and  harvester,  based 
on  the  principles  first  employed  in  the  crude 
Gallic  header.  Gradually  the  inventive  genius 
of  this  country  has  improved  the  machinery  de- 
vised in  England  until  now  the  wheat  on  the  great 
farms  is  cut,  threshed,  and  flung  on  the  ground 
in  tiers  of  sacks,  ready  for  shipment,  the  grain 
not  having  been  handled  by  men  during  the  whole 
process. 

One  of  these  great  "portable  factories,"  used 


22        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

in  California  wheat  fields,  cuts  a  forty  foot  swath, 
is  drawn  by  a  traction  engine,  and  its  day's  work 
is  to  cut,  thresh,  and  sack  the  wheat  from  120 
acres.  It  takes  eight  men  to  operate  this  combina- 
tion harvester,  at  a  cost  of  but  thirty  to  fifty  cents 
per  acre.  Since  the  price  is  about  $7,500,  these  big 
harvesting  outfits  belong  to  wheat-raising  on  a 
mammoth  scale. 

The  self-binder,  drawn  by  several  horses  driven 
by  one  man,  is  seen  harvesting  small  wheat  fields. 
It  is  followed  by  helpers  who  shock  the  grain, 
to  dry  it  before  it  is  stacked.  Threshing  comes 
later,  and  the  grain  may  wait  for  months  before 
it  leaves  the  granary  for  the  mills. 

The  harvest  of  wheat  in  our  own  country  has 
been  described  above.  America  is  by  no  means 
the  only  wheat-growing  country,  though  it  is 
ahead  of  all  others  in  the  world.  Russia  is  its 
greatest  rival.  The  smaller  countries  of  Europe 
all  grow  wheat,  many  of  them  more  than  they  need 
for  home  markets.  India,  Siberia,  North  and 
South  Africa,  Australia,  New  Zealand,  Argentina, 
Chile,  and  Uruguay  are  all  wheat-growing  coun- 
tries. Most  of  the  wheat  is  raised  in  the  northern 
hemisphere,  and  much  is  shipped  thither  from  the 
southern  wheat  regions.  Canada  is  becoming 
one  of  the  greatest  wheat  countries  of  the  world. 


BREAD    PLANTS  23 

THE    KINDS    OF   WHEAT 

Between  two  and  three  hundred  varieties  of 
wheat  were  selected  from  a  thousand  varieties 
tested  by  the'  United  States  Department  of 
Agriculture,  as  best  adapted  to  conditions  in  differ- 
ent parts  of  this  country.  The  vast  number  of 
varieties  grown  the  world  over  prove  that  wheat 
is  one  of  the  oldest  plants  in  cultivation.  History 
tells  the  same  thing.  In  the  accounts  of  the 
childhood  of  many  nations,  the  growing  of  wheat 
is  fully  dwelt  upon,  and  the  making  of  white  bread 
from  the  ground  grain. 

The  Lake-dwellers,  of  the  early  Stone  Age, 
left  behind  them  in  their  strange,  prehistoric 
habitations,  grains  of  wheat  half  the  size  of  modern 
varieties.  Researches  have  found  four  different 
species  represented  by  the  stores  uncovered  in 
Switzerland. 

Wheat  was  the  staple  crop  of  the  ancients  in 
Egypt  and  Palestine.  The  Chinese  raised  it  for 
more  than  three  thousand  years.  No  wonder  that 
the  botanists  have  given  up  hope  of  finding  the 
wild  species  from  which  the  cultivated  forms  have 
sprung.  In  all  probability,  it  is  no  longer  growing 
wild  anywhere.  However,  it  is  believed  that  the 
original  home  of  the  wild  wheat  was  in  the  valley 


24       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

of  the  Tigris  and  Euphrates  rivers,  and  from  thence 
it  spread  in  all  directions,  and  has  become  the 
principal  food  plant  of  civilized  nations. 

Four  distinct  species  of  wheat  are  recognized 
as  parents  of  the  cultivated  varieties:  i.  Com- 
mon wheat  (Triticum  vulgar  e)  bearded  and  beard- 
less, white  and  red,  winter  and  spring  —  an 
ancient  type.  2.  Poulard  wheat  (T.  turgidum) 
called  Egyptian  wheat,  and  "wheat  of  miracle," 
because  its  spikes  break  into  fruitful  branches. 
Not  an  old  type.  3.  Hard  wheat  (T.  durum) 
probably  derived  from  common  wheat.  4.  Polish 
wheat  ( 7'.  polonicum)  the  German  gummer,  a  large 
plant,  with  small  heads,  much  grown  in  Spain. 

Related  to  wheat  proper  are  the  spelts,  one- 
grained  species,  with  a  husk  around  each  kernel, 
and  the  two-grained,  or  starch  wheat,  called  em- 
mer.  These  are  comparatively  primitive  and  un- 
important grains. 

How  does  a  variety  originate?  This  is  one  way. 
Mr.  Abraham  Fultz  was  walking  though  his 
wheat  field  one  day,  and  he  happened  to  see  a 
plant  that  bore  three  heads  of  beardless  wheat,  in 
a  field  that  was  bearded.  He  gathered  the  heads, 
which  were  large,  and  the  kernels  good.  He 
planted  them  the  next  year,  and  the  plants  pro- 
duced were  so  fruitful  that  he  decided  to  save  all 


BREAD    PLANTS  2$ 

the  grain,  and  grow  it  for  a  number  of  years.  In 
a  surprisingly  short  time  he  has  "fixed"  the  char- 
acteristics of  a  fine  new  variety.  He  distributed 
seed  and  now  the  "Fultz  wheat"  is  the  leading 
soft  winter  whe'at  in  this  country,  and  is  established 
in  many  foreign  countries.  It  originated  in  1862. 

Another  way  of  originating  a  variety  is  to  choose 
only  the  best  seed  for  planting,  and  only  the  best 
again  "out  of  each  planting  of  the  selected  seeds. 
Gradually  the  plants  improve  in  size  and  quality 
and  an  improved  variety  is  achieved,  whose  yield 
is  several  bushels  per  acre  better  than  before  the 
selection  of  seed  was  started. 

A  third  way  to  get  a  new  and  better  variety 
is  to  cross  artificially  two  varieties  whose  characters 
it  is  desirable  to  join.  A  sturdy  straw,  bearing 
full,  large  heads  may  resujt  from  crossing  a  variety 
with  one  of  these  traits  and  another  with  the  other 
trait.  So  two  varieties,  each  with  bad  faults  may 
be  combined  to  make  a  very  good  one. 

Cross-fertilization  is  a  delicate,  but  simple 
operation,  that  must  be  begun  while  the  flowers 
are  in  bud,  the  stamens  removed  to  prevent  self- 
fertilization  in  the  flowers  that  set  seed  for  the 
new  strain.  Pollen  is  carried  by  a  camel's-hair 
brush  to  the  ripe  stigmas,  which  are  protected 
before  and  after  this  pollenation  by  tissue  paper, 


26       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

securely  wrapped  and  tied  above  and  below  the 
head. 

Is  such  work  as  making  new  varieties  worth 
while?  Mr.  Burbank  says:  "If  a  new  wheat 
were  bred  that  would  yield  only  one  grain  more  to 
each  head,  Nature  would  produce  annually,  with- 
out effort  or  cost  for  man,  15,000,000  extra  bushels 
of  wheat  in  the  United  States  alone. " 

THE   WHEAT   DISTRICTS 

The  soft  wheat  district  is  along  our  North 
Atlantic  coast.  The  semi-hard  district  is  south 
of  the  Great  Lakes.  Hard  spring  wheat  culture 
centres  in  the  Red  River  Valley.  Kansas  is  the 
centre  of  the  hard  winter  wheat  district.  The 
durum  wheat  area  centres  in  northern  Texas. 
White  wheat  grows  on  the  Pacific  coast.  Red 
wheat  grows  from  Kansas  to  the  Red  River  Valley. 
White  wheats  are  starchy.  Wheats  rich  in  gluten 
make  the  best  bread.  Such  are  the  varieties 
grown  on  the  northern  and  central  plains  of  the 
United  States,  Canada,  southern  Argentina,  and 
eastern  and  southern  Russia.  Macaroni  wheat, 
rich  in  gluten,  grows  in  the  Mediterranean 
countries.  Durum  wheat  grows  well  on  alkali 
soils,  and  in  semi-arid  regions.  It  is  a  sturdy  new 


BREAD    PLANTS  2J 

group  of  drought-resistant,  rust-resistant  varieties, 
that  has  made  wheat-growing  possible  in  regions 
where,  a  few  years  ago,  no  known  varieties  would 
have  any  chance  at  all.  Our  millers  are  learning 
to  mix  it  with'  other  kinds  in  flour.  It  is  a  fine 
macaroni  wheat. 

Strength  of  the  straw  of  some  wheats  make  it 
a  valuable  by-product  of  the  harvest.  Leghorn 
hats  are  woven  of  the  wiry  stems  of  an  Italian 
wheat,  a  Tuscan,  bearded  variety.  Roofs  are 
thatched,  chairs  seated,  mattresses  stuffed,  bee- 
hives and  baskets  woven  of  wheat  straw.  It  is  a 
good  fodder  for  cattle,  green  or  dry.  Twisted 
into  hard  ropes  it  often  furnishes  fuel  for  the 
engines  that  run  the  great  harvesters.  Pressed 
into  bales,  and  these  built  into  temporary  walls, 
the  straw  often  holds  thousands  of  bushels  of  wheat 
in  storage  until  time  for  shipment  comes.  Used  as 
bedding  in  stables,  straw  finally  returns  to  the 
soil  with  the  stable  manure,  adding  vegetable 
fibre  that  loosens  heavy  clay,  and  makes  of  it 
good  loam  for  the  growing  of  wheat. 

OATS 

Wheat,  rye,  and  barley  are  members  of  one 
subdivision  of  the  great  Grass  Family.  They  all 


28        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

bear  their  seeds  in  spikes,  bald  or  bearded.  Oats 
stand  alone,  the  grain  with  a  loose,  branched  head, 
made  of  separate  kernels.  Each  kernel  has  an 
outside  papery  husk  and  an  inner  hull  that  is 
ground  up  in  making  oatmeal,  or  removed  in 
some  forms  of  the  cereal.  Oatmeal  feeds  thou- 
sands of  people  every  morning  of  the  year. 

Botanists,  curious  to  find  growing  the  wild  parent 
of  cultivated  oats,  are  constantly  being  deceived 
by  patches  of  oats,  wild  enough,  but  only  run- 
aways from  fields.  The  seeds  are  often  carried 
by  birds,  often  by  other  chance  rides.  Oats  are 
able  to  get  on  very  well  in  wild  land,  where  they 
come  up  year  after  year,  and  spread  over  wider 
areas  by  self-seeding.  It  is  not  likely  that  any  one 
will  ever  find  the  aboriginal  species  of  oats,  and 
feel  sure  enough  to  satisfy  himself. 

Yet  it  seems  probable  that  this  grain  was  first 
cultivated  in  the  temperate  and  colder  parts  of 
eastern  Europe  and  western  Asia.  Its  culture 
has  extended  into  the  United  States  and  Canada, 
and  eastward  into  China  and  Siberia,  until  to-day 
the  oat  crop  is  greater  in  bulk  than  any  other 
grain  crop. 

Oats,  "the  grain  of  hardiness,"  divide  hon- 
ors with  wheat,  barley,  and  rye,  in  fields  that 
stretch  up  north  almost  to  the  Arctic  Circle. 


BREAD   PLANTS  2g 

In  the  bleak  climate  of  northern  Scotland,  this  is 
the  staple  food  crop.  So  it  is  in  Iceland,  in 
Alaska,  in  Russia,  and  Siberia.  Rye  and  oats 
furnished  the  bread  of  Europe  in  the  Middle 
Ages,  and  wheat  bread  has  replaced  the  coarser 
loaves  and  cakes  but  partially. 

The  reason  oats  are  so  extensively  used  as 
human  food  is  because  they  lead  all  the  grains  in 
muscle-forming  elements.  They  contain  a  large 
proportion  of  oily  and  nitrogenous  materials,  and 
a  low  percentage  of  starch.  Oatmeal  porridge  is 
given  the  credit  for  producing  the  brain  and  brawn 
of  the  Scotch  and  other  hardy  European  races. 

England  raises  oats,  but  oatmeal  porridge  is  not 
a  national  dish.  The  famous  dialogue  contains 
both  a  clever  retort  and  a  plain  fact.  An  English- 
man, with  a  party  of  friends,  met  on  the  road  a 
Highlander  carrying  a  bag  of  oats.  Pointing  to 
it  he  said:  "That  is  oats  —  the  grain  that  in 
England  is  fed  to  horses;  in  Scotland  it  is  fed  to 
men!"  The  Scotchman  was  not  so  stolid  as  he 
looked,  for  his  reply  came  promptly:  "True 
enough;  and  that  is  the  reason  why  in  England  you 
grow  such  fine  horses,  and  in  Scotland  we  grow 
such  fine  men!" 

Oats  grow  best  in  cold  regions;  they  do  poorly 
in  countries  around  the  Mediterranean,  because 


3Q        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

the  climate  is  too  warm.  The  same  is  true  in 
parts  of  the  United  States.  In  some  regions 
where  the  heads  do  not  fill  out  well  the  grain  is 
profitably  sown  for  forage  and  pasture.  The 
succulent  stems  are  rich  in  nutriment,  they  dry 
quickly  and  make  excellent  hay.  Plowed  under, 
they  enrich  the  soil. 

Oat  straw  is  used  extensively  for  paper-making, 
for  packing,  stuffing  mattresses,  and  for  bedding 
for  stock  in  barns. 

Smut  is  a  fungous  disease  that  appears  when 
the  oat  plants  should  be  setting  seed.  Instead, 
the  heads  become  masses  of  loose,  black  powder. 
The  particles  of  dust  are  the  spores  of  the  destroy- 
ing smut.  They  are  scattered  by  the  wind,  and 
lodge  in  the  spreading  bracts,  the  green  "chaff" 
of  sound  oats.  When  these  oats  are  sown  next 
spring  the  spores  sprout  with  the  sprouting  of  the 
grain.  The  fungus  grows  into  thread-like  meshes 
that  penetrate  the  tissues  of  the  young  oat  plant, 
robbing  it  of  the  food  that  the  leaves  prepare,  and 
finally  replacing  the  seeds  entirely  with  the  black, 
slimy  masses  that  ripen  into  the  black  powder. 

Only  oats  that  carry  the  spores  into  the  ground 
with  them  will  produce  smut  bodies  in  the  place  of 
kernels.  This  fact  enables  the  farmer  to  prevent 
the  disease.  He  simply  soaks  his  seed  oats  for  a 


BREAD    PLANTS  3! 

day  in  a  weak  solution  of  formalin,  a  cheap  drug 
that  destroys  the  smut  spores  hid  in  the  hulls,  and 
does  not  injure  the  kernel  at  all.  Spores  that  fly 
about  the  oat  field  cannot  injure  the  plants  they 
lodge  on,  but 'next  year's  plants  are  endangered. 
The  formalin  bath  saves  the  farmers  of  the  United 
States  millions  of  dollars  annually  in  the  oat  crop. 


RYE 


Because  it  grows  on  soil  too  poor  and  arid  for 
other  grains,  rye  is  called  "the  grain  of  poverty." 
Rye  meal  makes  the  bread  of  peasants  in  European 
countries,  over  a  vast  area  of  the  poorest,  and  so 
the  cheapest,  land.  The  extremes  of  heat  and  cold 
are  suffered  by  these  people,  whose  agriculture 
is  of  a  hopelessly  primitive  sort.  They  scratch 
in  the  grain,  drag  or  harrow  it,  and  gather  the 
harvest  with  hand  sickles,  as  their  parents  have 
done  for  generations  without  number. 

In  Russia  more  rye  is  grown  than  in  any  other 
country.  It  is  a  great  crop  in  Scandinavia  and 
northern  Germany,  where  everybody  eats  rye 
bread  and  likes  it.  The  German  "pumpernickel" 
is  a  bread  that  many  Americans  like.  Not  all  of 
them  know  that  they'are  eating  the  rye  loaf,  the 
"black  bread,"  of  Europe.  The  liking  for  this 


32       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

loaf  may  be  hereditary  in  those  of  us  who  come  of 
New  England  ancestry,  for  the  brown  bread  that 
accompanied  the  baked  beans  was  "half  rye  and 
half  Indian  meal. "  That  loaf  was  and  is  deserv- 
edly popular. 

Rye  is  a  grain  used  extensively  in  the  making 
of  whiskey.  It  is  more  for  this  purpose  than  for 
any  other  that  the  crop  is  raised  in  the  United 
States.  Poor  land  is  often  sowed  to  rye  for  its 
improvement;  the  green  crop  is  turned  under  or 
pastured,  the  roots  left  to  form  humus. 

Rye  straw  is  wiry  and  long,  on  good  land,  and 
-.though  too  fibrous  to  make  good  forage  for  cattle 
when  ripe  it  is  the  best  for  making  paper  and  paste- 
board, for  straw  hats,  and  bedding  stables  for 
horses.  The  longest  straw  is  used  by  gardeners 
to  wrap  tender  trees  and  shrubs  that  must  stay 
outdoors  all  winter.  It  is  used  as  packing  ma- 
terial by  manufacturers  of  all  kinds  of  fragile 
wares.  The  straw  often  pays  better  than  the 
grain. 

Rye  is  known  in  very  few  varieties,  and  is 
probably  not  one  of  the  oldest  cultivated  grains. 
Its  parent  form,  botanists  say,  grew  on  the  moun- 
tainous, dry  regions  from  southern  Europe  east- 
ward to  Central  Asia. 

The  "head"  of  a  stalk  of  rye  is  like  that  of 


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BREAD   PLANTS  33 

bearded  wheat;  the  prickly,  needle-like  beard 
makes  the  handling  of  the  grain  at  harvest  time 
very  hard  on  the  hands  of  those  who  bind  and 
stack  the  grain.  The  flower  of  rye  is  similar  to 
to  the  flower  of  wheat. 

The  grain  contains  more  bran  than  wheat,  and 
less  starch,  but  more  sugar.  Rye  bread  is  dark 
in  color  and  sweet,  with  a  flavor  ^that  is  pleasantly 
aromatic  and  slightly  sour.  It  spoils  the  flour 
to  grind  rye  fine  and  discard  its  bran,  for  therein 
the  characteristic  taste  is  found. 

Rye  is  particularly  susceptible  to  attack  by  a 
fungus  called  ergot,  whose  black  or  purplish  body 
develops  at  the  expense  of  the  kernel.  The 
destruction  of  a  part  of  the  grain  crop  is  not  all 
the  harm  this  disease  does  to  the  farmer.  Cattle 
fed  on  hay  and  grain  infected  with  the  fungus  are 
gradually  poisoned;  they  develop  loathsome  sores, 
and  may  lose  hoofs,  tail,  ears,  and  horns  as  the 
disease  progresses. 

To  prevent  the  spread  of  ergot  in  grain  fields 
and  pastures,  infected  plants  must  be  cut  and 
destroyed.  Farmers  who  understand  that  the 
spores  are  carried  by  wind  to  fields  in  bloom  are 
careful  to  have  roadside  grasses  cut.  They  also 
dip  their  seed  grain  in  a  fungicide,  like  diluted 
formalin. 


34        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 
BARLEY 

Barley  is  the  hardiest  and  one  of  the  oldest 
grains  in  cultivation.  It  will  grow  much  farther 
north  than  wheat;  it  is  a  staple  crop  in  Norway, 
Russia,  and  Siberia,  where  it  grows  right  up  to  the 
Arctic  Circle.  This  is  a  grain  from  which  the 
bread  of  peasants  is  made;  and  people  who  scorn 
to  eat  barley,  drink  it  in  the  form  of  ale  and  beer. 
The  coarse,  unleavened  barley  cakes  of  Scotland 
are  nutritious,  but  the  grain  is  lacking  in  gluten, 
a  very  important  food  element.  Barley  flour  will 
not  make  "risen  bread"  any  more  than  cornmeal 
will.  But  it  has  the  whole  nutritious  grain,  minus 
only  the  hard  cuticle.  "Pearl  barley"  has  lost 
some  valuable  substance  by  the  processes  that 
grind  the  kernel  to  a  smooth,  polished  ball.  It  is 
chiefly  used  in  soups  and  gruels. 

The  great  demand  for  barley  comes  from  the 
brewers,  who  use  it  in  the  making  of  beer.  This  is 
the  reason  it  is  preferred  to  other  grains:  it  is 
quickest  to  sprout.  The  sprouting  process  changes 
the  starch  of  the  kernels  into  a  kind  of  sugar, 
called  maltose. 

The  grain  is  first  cleaned,  then  soaked  and 
spread  out  in  a  warm  place  to  sprout.  When  the 
little  root  is  two-thirds  the  length  of  the  grain,  the 


BREAD    PLANTS  35 

transformation  of  starch  to  sugar  has  been  com- 
pleted. The  grain  is  now  heated,  to  kill  the  grow- 
ing parts  and  dry  the  kernels.  The  process  just 
ended  is  called  the  "malting"  of  the  grain.  The 
dry  malt  may  be  stored  or  shipped.  Before  being 
used  further  it  is  ground  into  meal,  then  mixed  with 
water,  which  soaks  out  the  sugar.  The  liquid 
is  now  strained,  and  yeast  is  added  to  it,  to  set  up 
fermentation.  Alcohol  and  carbonic  acid  gas 
are  two  substances  into  which  the  sugar  is  trans- 
formed. In  the  casks,  the  gas  is  confined,  so  that 
when  the  beverage  is  drawn,  it  is  liberated  in  the 
bubbles  that  rise  in  foam  at  the  top  of  the  mug  or 
glass.  The  hops  used  keep  the  beer  from  souring. 
By  the  same  general  process  ale  and  porter  are 
made.  Gin  and  whiskey  are  made  by  distilling 
the  alcohol  from  the  light  beverages.  Beer  con- 
tains but  2  per  cent,  alcohol. 

Another  fact  that  makes  barley  "the  brewer's 
grain,"  par  excellence,  is  this:  it  grows  in  warm  as 
well  as  cold  countries.  Turkey  and  France  and 
California  raise  a  great  acreage  of  this  grain  for 
the  breweries.  "Chevelier,"  the  best  variety 
for  brewing,  is  grown  to  perfection  in  the  valley 
land  of  the  Coast  Range. 

Wild  barley  has  been  found  growing  in  western 
Asia,  but  whether  it  escaped  from  cultivation,  or 


36       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

represents  a  race  that  never  came  under  the  hand 
of  man,  it  is  not  possible  to  decide.  It  has  two  rows 
of  kernels  in  the  head  —  a  type  that  was  found 
in  the  remains  of  the  civilization  of  the  Lake- 
dwellers,  who  represent  man  in  the  early  Stone 
Age.  With  it  has  been  found  the  six-rowed 
species,  which  the  earliest  Egyptian  monuments 
also  preserved.  A  strange  fact  is  that  the  common 
four-rowed  species  is  not  represented  among  the 
barleys  grown  by  these  primitive  peoples,  though 
both  of  the  more  productive  species  must  have 
originated  from  the  scanty,  two-rowed  kind. 

People  who  eat  barley  bread  are  becoming  fewer 
as  the  conditions  of  life  are  eased.  Immigrants 
from  the  north  of  Europe  to  Minnesota  grow 
barley,  first  for  themselves,  but  soon  for  their 
cattle,  only.  It  is  a  good  green  forage  and  pas- 
ture after  an  early  crop  is  taken  off  the  land.  As 
a  catch  crop,  it  is  sowed  in  summer  and  plowed 
under.  This  "green  manure"  adds  to  heavy 
land  the  fibre  that  converts  it  into  a  mellow  loam, 
easy  to  work,  able  to  hold  moisture,  and  richer  by 
the  addition  of  plant  foods  the  soil  needs. 

CORN 

The  biggest  thing  in  this  country  is  our  corn 
crop.  And  the  most  wonderful  thing  about  it  it 


BREAD    PLANTS  37 

that  each  year  the  crop  is  bigger, —  the  miracle  is 
repeated,  more  granaries  are  filled  each  time  the 
autumn  rolls  around.  Let  us  look  at  a  few  figures, 
and  try  to  grasp  their  meaning.  In  1910  our  corn 
crop  was  worth  over  $  1,500,000,000!  Four  times 
as  much  corn  as  was  raised  in  all  the  cornfields  of 
all  the  other  continents.  A  procession  of  farmers' 
wagons,  each  loaded  with  fifty  bushels  of  corn,  and 
drawn  by  the  farmer's  team,  would  be  long  enough 
to  reach  nine  times  around  the  earth.  For  when 
a  girdle  is  complete,  there  would  be  left  in  cribs 
and  elevators  eight  times  as  much  corn  as  was  in 
that  single  line  of  wagons,  twenty-five  thousand 
miles  long. 

The  great  corn  states  are  Illinois,  Iowa,  Missouri, 
and  Nebraska.  In  1910,  Illinois  raised  414  mil- 
lion bushels,  almost  one  third  of  the  crop  in  the 
whole  country.  Large-eared  dent  corn  is  grown 
in  the  great  "corn  belt"  of  the  central  states. 
The  yield  per  acre  averages  but  twenty-seven 
bushels.  Many  farmers  raise  three  times  that 
quantity.  The  northeastern  states,  that  raise  the 
round-grained  flint  corn,  do  not  have  a  large  acre- 
age, but  the  average  yield  is  high,  despite  their 
wornout  land.  Down  South  the  average  crop 
is  much  lower  than  in  the  corn  belt,  partly  due  to 
careless,  unenlightened  farming. 


38       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

Of  the  stupendous  corn  crops  raised  in  the 
United  States  only  4  per  cent,  goes  to  other 
countries  as  grain  and  meal.  We  feed  the  rest  to 
cattle  and  hogs,  and  ship  the  meat.  This  brings 
the  farmer  much  more  money,  and  returns  to  the 
land  much  of  the  best  fertilizing  elements  in  the 
manure  from  the  yards  where  stock  is  fattened. 
The  man  who  sells  his  corn  from  the  crib  robs  his 
land,  year  after  year.  He  must  fertilize  it,  and 
buying  commercial  fertilizers  is  a  costly  method. 

Better  corn  and  more  of  it  result  from  careful 
selecting  of  seed,  and  sorting  and  testing  it  before 
planting  time.  This  is  an  important  step  in  the 
great  forward  movement  in  farming  to-day. 

THE   RACES    OF   CORN 

We  find  in  New  England  cornfields,  sweet  corn 
and  flint  corn;  in  the  Corn  Belt  of  the  Central 
States,  chiefly  the  yellow  dents;  in  the  South,  white 
dent  varieties.  Dent  corns  have  their  starchy 
content  extended  to  the  top  of  the  grain,  and 
shrinking  at  maturity,  thus  forming  the  dent,  or 
depression.  Flint  corn  is  not  so,  for  the  starchy 
centre  is  overlaid  with  the  layer  of  hard,  horny 
material  that  does  not  shrink. 

Pop  corn  is  small,  and  its  grains  explode  into  a 


BREAD    PLANTS  39 

light,  cottony  mass  when  heated.  Sweet  corn  is 
rich  in  sugar  and  protein.  Its  kernels  shrink 
and  wrinkle  in  drying.  Pod  corn,  called  also 
"coyote  corn,"  is  a  Mexican  race  that  has 
each  kernel,  as  well  as  the  ear,  enclosed  in  a 
papery  husk.  Pop  corn  may  have  originated 
from  a  primitive  pod  corn.  In  the  mummy 
cases  of  Peruvian  tombs  grains  of  another  type 
were  first  found  by  scientists.  It  is  called  soft 
corn,  because  the  horny  part  is  wanting  in  the 
grain.  It  is  now  grown  in  Mexico  and  parts  of 
South  America. 

Darwin  thought  that  all  the  "agricultural 
species"  of  corn  are  descendants  of  the  pod  corn 
of  Mexico.  The  best  authorities  now  hold  that 
the  aboriginal  ancestor  of  corn  is  probably  extinct. 
The  corn-like  plant,  teosinte,  that  grows  wild  in 
^Mexico,  is  believed  to  be  one  parent  of  corn,  but 
the  other  is  unknown.  Wild  corn  has  never  been 
found. 

Whatever  the  form  of  the  original  wild  species, 
there  have  sprung  from  it  the  six  races  named 
above:  pod,  pop,  sweet,  flint,  soft,  and  dent. 

Sweet  corn  was  in  cultivation  by  the  Susque- 
hanna  Indians  in  1779,  when  its  qualities  were 
first  discovered  by  white  settlers.  No  history  of 
the  species  is  known  behind  that  date,  though 


40       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

many  varieties  have  been  developed  since.  The 
great  industry  of  canning  corn  is  supplied  by 
fields  of  this  green  crop.  It  is  an  important 
vegetable  in  American  gardens  throughout  the 
growing  season. 

The  seventy-day  corn  of  the  colder  parts  of  the 
country,  that  makes  a  dwarf  stalk,  and  attends 
strictly  to  the  business  of  maturing  the  ears  before 
frost  comes,  illustrates  the  changes  that  adapt  a 
plant  to  its  environment.  The  2O-foot  stalks  in  a 
Southern  field,  that  take  six  months  to  produce  a 
crop,  illustrate  the  same  fact.  Varieties  have 
"strains"  adapted  to  difficult  conditions  of  climate 
and  soil. 

The  native  country  of  the  maize  plant  is 
probably  Mexico.  We  cannot  be  sure.  It  was 
unknown  in  Europe  when  the  Spaniards  under 
Columbus  found  the  Indians  on  the  Island  of 
Haiti  growing  fields  of  a  strange  plant  they  called 
"mahiz."  In  a  letter  to  Ferdinand  and  Isabella, 
Columbus  says  of  his  brother:  "During  a 
journey  into  the  interior  he  found  a  dense  popu- 
lation, entirely  agricultural,  and  at  one  place 
passed  through  eighteen  miles  of  cornfields." 
De  Soto  wrote  home  about  the  Indian  villages, 
where  corn  and  meal  were  stored  in  large  quan- 
tities, and  miles  upon  miles  of  growing  grain 


BREAD   PLANTS  4! 

surrounded  them.  Cortez  was  amazed  at  the 
flourishing  fields  of  corn  growing  in  Mexico,  and 
the  stores  of  this  grain  gathered  as  tribute  by  the 
ruler.  The  Puritans  were  saved  from  starvation 
during  those  first  terrible  winters  by  corn  brought 
them  by  the  friendly  Indians.  Fifty  years  later 
the  same  Puritans,  or  their  sons,  in  the  King 
Philip's  war,  "took  possession  of  one  thousand 
acres  of  corn,  which  was  harvested  by  the  English, 
and  disposed  of  according  to  their  direction." 
The  Six  Nations,  the  best-organized  confederation 
of  American  Indians,  had  cultivated  apple  orchards 
and  cornfields  that  the  white  settlers  could  not 
match,  in  central  New  York.  In  the  middle  part 
of  the  country  other  tribes  raised  corn  for  their 
food  supply.  Indian  mounds,  of  uncertain  but 
ancient  date,  contain  corn,  as  did  the  tombs  of 
the  Incas  in  Peru,  where  the  maize  plant  was  wor- 
shipped as  a  divinity  that  had  the  life  of  the  people 
in  its  hand.  Far  back  to  the  earliest  times  goes 
this  reverence  for  the  plant  that  feeds  the  race. 

No  wild  plant  that  looks  at  all  like  corn  has 
been  found  in  foreign  countries,  though  a  thorough 
search  has  been  made  in  all  likely  places  by  scien- 
tists. The  best  authorities  agree  that  if  the  plant 
had  been  grown  in  Europe  or  Asia  before  it  was 
taken  there  from  America  it  would  have  been 


42        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

known  and  written  about.     So  it  must  be  Ameri- 
can in  origin. 

The  corn  kernel  is  a  little  plant,  wrapped  up 
with  the  provision  that  is  to  sustain  it  through  the 
period  between  its  sprouting  in  the  ground,  and 
the  appearance  of  root  and  leaf  blade,  capable  of 
supporting  the  plant  independently.  All  these 
possibilities  and  good  promises  are  wrapped  up  in 
a  tough,  waterproof  skin,  the  hull  of  the  grain. 
The  clear,  horny  portion  under  the  hull  is  rich  in 
protein,  the  muscle-making  part.  The  germ, 
or  embryo  corn  plant,  is  rich  in  oil.  The  white 
filling  of  the  kernel  is  starch,  the  solid,  granular 
portion  that  was  soft  and  sweet  when  the  corn  was 
"in  the  milk."  It  is  quite  possible  in  corn  to 
separate  the  parts  bearing  oil,  protein  and  starch, 
at  a  glance,  for  the  germ  has  a  distinct  shape  and 
outline,  and  the  dark  proteid  matter  contrasts 
in  color  with  the  white  starch. 

CORN    PRODUCTS 

What  a  good  all-around  food  the  maize  is!  Do 
we  use  it  as  it  deserves?  Nothing  tastes  better 
when  one  is  hungry  than  corn  muffins,  or  a  loaf 
of  " Johnny-cake."  The  corn  flavor  is  unex- 
celled when  good  cooking  brings  it  out.  What 


BREAD    PLANTS  43 

else  but  this  rich  flavor  makes  the  epicure  take 
real  delight  in  the  "hoe  cakes  "of  the  mountaineers? 
These  are  nothing  but  fresh  meal  mixed  in  water 
to  form  a  smooth  batter,  which  is  baked  on  a  hoe 
or  on  stones  in 'an  open  fire.  The  Indians  origi- 
nated the  "corn  pone,"  baked  in  the  ashes,  still 
one  of  the  most  delicious  foods  made  of  corn  meal. 
Hominy  and  grits  are  cracked  corn,  which  are 
boiled  into  a  porridge.  Samp  is  hulled  corn,  of 
which  Roger  Williams  wrote:  "The  Indian  corne, 
beaten  and  boiled,  and  eaten  hot  or  cold  with 
milke  or  butter,  is  a  dish  exceeding  wholesome  for 
English  bodies."  Succotash  is  the  Indian  mix- 
ture of  green  corn  with  beans,  which  they  called 
"msickquatash."  Sweet  corn  on  the  cob  is 
delicious.  So  are  green  corn  puddings,  and  the 
same  corn,  canned  or  dried  for  winter  use. 

Parched  corn  was  a  staple  food  of  the  Indian 
tribes.  (No  doubt  parched  corn  led  up  to  pop  corn.) 
On  their  long  journeys  the  Indians  carried  little 
bags  of  parched  corn,  which  they  ate  with  water, 
and  it  sustained  them  in  times  of  war,  and  on 
hunting  expeditions.  It  was  no  inconvenience 
to  carry  enough  for  several  days  in  the  wilder- 
ness. 

Glucose  is  made  from  the  starch  in  the  corn 
•grain.  Formerly  the  glucose  mills  discarded  the 


44       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

germ  and  the  horny  portion,  both  rich  in  food 
elements.  Now  the  germs  are  ground  and  pressed 
to  extract  the  oil,  which  is  exported  to  European 
countries  where  it  is  considered  one  of  the  best 
lubricants.  It  is  used  also  in  soap-making,  and 
for  cooking.  A  process  of  vulcanizing  converts  it 
into  a  substitute  for  rubber. 

Dextrine,  a  valuable  gum,  is  a  by-product  of  the 
starch  and  glucose  factories.  Alcohol  and  whiskey 
are  made  from  the  fermentation  of  the  whole  grain. 
Ground  fine,  the  flour  and  meal  of  corn  are  among 
the  best  cereal  foods,  though  the  abundant  oil  is 
likely  to  become  rancid  in  a  short  time. 

Corncobs  are  an  excellent  fuel.  They  are 
burned  in  the  engines  that  drive  corn  threshers 
and  other  farm  machinery.  Corncob  pipes  are 
made  of  quantities  of  them.  The  stalks,  leaves, 
and  husks  yield  fibre  suitable  for  use  in  making 
papers  and  varnishes.  Nothing  is  so  good  as  corn- 
stalk pith  to  pack  the  water-tight  compartments 
behind  the  armor  plates  of  battleships.  Corn 
silks  are  used  in  making  filters.  The  husks  have 
long  been  woven  into  door  mats  and  stuffed  into 
mattresses.  Dry  stalks  make  winter  pasture  for 
cattle  and  horses.  Green  corn  is  put  into  silos  to 
feed  dairy  cattle  in  winter.  Cut  up,  it  makes  part 
of  a  balanced  ration  for  stock  and  poultry,  espe- 


BREAD   PLANTS  45 

cially  when  mixed  with  the  cake  from  which  corn 
oil  has  been  pressed. 

POP  CORN 

The  Tom  Thumb  race  of  corn  has  in  the  starchy 
part  of  the  grain  sufficient  moisture  to  explode  it 
when  heated.  This  "popping"  of  corn  turns  the 
grain  wrong  side  out,  dries  it  and  makes  it  twenty 
times  as  large  as  it  was  before.  Because  it  has  an 
excess  of  protein,  pop  corn  is  very  nutritious. 
Combined  with  syrup,  it  is  a  confection  that 
children  enjoy,  and  wise  parents  are  glad  to  give 
them.  It  makes  a  delicious,  easily  digested,  and 
wholesome  food.  The  only  trouble  is  that  factory- 
made  pop  corn  balls  and  bricks  are  often  stale,  and 
not  sweetened  with  pure  sugar.  Home-made 
things  are  usually  best. 

In  various  parts  of  Iowa  and  neighboring  states 
quantities  of  pop  corn  are  raised  by  farmers  that 
give  their  time  to  this  crop.  They  sell  it  to  the 
wholesaler,  who  supplies  the  manufacturer.  As  a 
rule,  the  crop  is  kept  till  the  second  year.  It  is 
too  moist  to  pop  well  before  that  time,  unless 
kiln-dried. 

Two  races  of  pop  corn  are  grown:  the  rice  type, 
with  clear,  horny  grains  sharply  beaked  at  the 


46        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

place  where  the  silk  was  attached,  and  the  pearl 
type,  with  grains  rounded  on  top,  like  the  flint  corn 
of  the  fields,  or  flat-topped.  Red,  blue,  and  white 
are  the  colors  of  the  grains,  solid  or  mixed  on  the 
cob.  The  pop  corn  field  is  easily  recognized  by 
the  slim  stalks  and  small  ears,  though  the  stalks 
are  often  tall. 

It  is  a  special  kind  of  farming  to  get  the  crop 
matured  before  frost;  then  it  must  stand  to  let  the 
frost  harden  the  ears  before  the  stalks  are  cut  and 
shocked  to  dry,  then  husked  by  hand  for  storage 
or  immediate  shipment.  One  little  town  in  Iowa 
is  the  point  from  which  hundreds  of  carloads  of 
pop  corn  go  each  autumn  to  the  wholesale  dealer. 

THE   WONDERFUL   MAIZE    PLANT 

A  sprouting  grain  of  corn  sends  a  pointed  leaf, 
rolled  into  a  close  tube,  up  to  the  light,  while  a 
tapering  root  goes  downward,  and  branches  into 
fibrous  feeding  roots  along  its  sides.  Out  of  the 
tip  of  the  leaf  tube  a  slenderer  tube  rises,  and 
carries  the  plant  higher,  while  the  first  leaf  spreads 
out  flat.  As  the  leaf  arches  its  blade,  the  second 
one  loosens,  and  the  third  appears.  Each  leaf 
holds  its  younger  brother  in  a  close  protecting  em- 
brace until  it  is  able  to  endure  the  hot  sun,  when 


BREAD    PLANTS  47 

this  one  becomes  in  turn  the  nurse  of  another. 
The  stalk  is  hidden  by  the  sheaths  of  the  several 
leaves,  until  at  last  the  tassel  appears,  and  leaf- 
making  is  at  an  end.  In  the  angle  of  certain  leaves 
the  stem  sends1  out  short  branches.  These  are 
clothed  with  crowded  leaves,  and  topped  with  a 
bunch  of  long  silks.  Tassels  and  the  miniature 
ears  are  the  flower  clusters  of  the  corn  plant. 

The 'leaf  of  the  corn  plant. — All  the  food  the 
roots  gather  is  carried  to  the  leaves  for  chem- 
ical transformation  into  nutritious  sap.  Crude 
materials  gathered  from  the  soil  and  absorbed 
from  the  air,  assemble  in  the  leaf  laboratories, 
where  the  energy  of  sunlight  is  used  to  convert 
raw  materials  into  rich,  starchy  food,  which  flows 
back  to  supply  the  growing  parts  of  the  plant. 

The  arch  of  a  corn  leaf  is  graceful,  indeed. 
What  is  far  more  important  to  the  plant  is  the  fact 
that  the  greatest  possible  amount  of  leaf  surface 
is  exposed  to  the  direct  rays  of  the  sun.  When  the 
air  is  moist,  "you  can  see  corn  grow"  in  mid- 
summer. The  starch  factories  are  working  at 
great  pressure.  Farmers  say  "you  can  hear  it 
grow"  by  night.  A  multitude  of  snapping  noises 
are  heard,  suggesting  the  lengthening  of  fibres. 
Quantities  of  water  are  exhaled  as  invisible  vapor 
from  pores  located  chiefly  on  the  upper  surface  of 


48        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

each  leaf.  When  the  dry  winds  rob  the  soil  of 
moisture,  the  roots  go  deeper.  The  leaves  roll 
their  edges  inward  and  sometimes  overlap,  in  order 
to  reduce  the  amount  of  surface  exposed  to  sun  and 
wind.  The  pores  are  thus  closed  to  save  the 
water  supply.  When  rains  come,  the  normal  con- 
ditions are  restored,  and  food-making  becomes  the 
chief  business  of  the  plant.  Notice  how  the  corn- 
husks,  even,  spread  out  into  leaves,  to  do  their 
share  of  this  work  while  their  bases  protect  the  ear. 
Even  the  stalk  is  green,  and  able  to  join  in  the 
labors  of  the  leaves. 

How  is  it  that  the  corn  plant  can  carry  so  much 
sail,  and  yet  not  have  its  leaves  whipped  into 
strings  by  the  winds?  Test  for  yourselves  the 
flexibility  and  strength  of  the  midrib  of  a  leaf, 
the  fibres  in  the  leaf  margins,  and  in  the  tubular 
leaf  base  that  sheathes  the  stalk.  Notice  the 
frilling  of  the  leaf  blade,  especially  near  its  joining 
with  the  sheath.  Swing  the  whole  leaf  as  far  as 
possible,  to  find  out  what  amount  of  play  the  leaf 
sheath  allows  by  its  own  flexibility.  What  part 
of  a  circle  is  this  play?  Now  hold  the  sheath 
tightly  against  the  stalk,  and  find  out  the  use  of 
the  frilling  of  the  leaf  blade.  Pull  the  tip  to  left 
or  right  until  the  frill  is  straight.  Reverse  the 
direction,  until  the  opposite  frill  is  taken  up. 


BREAD    PLANTS  49 

How  much  play  has  the  blade  independent  of  the 
swinging  sheath?  What  amount  of  play  has  the 
whole  leaf? 

The  leaf  has  a  spiral  twist  in  its  midrib  that 
enables  it  to  avoid  the  full  force  of  the  wind.  The 
frills  enable  the  midrib  to  turn  to  left  or  right, 
almost  as  easily  as  if  it  were  hinged.  By  swinging 
round  the  stalk,  and  getting  out  of  the  way  as 
much  as  possible,  the  leaves  avoid  the  slitting 
they  would  get  if  they  were  flat  and  rigidly  inserted 
on  the  stalk.  Much  protection  is  afforded  by 
stalks  standing  in  close  ranks  in  the  field. 

The  rain-guard  is  one  of  the  neatest  devices  a 
corn  plant  can  show.  It  prevents  water  from 
getting  down  between  leaf-sheath  and  stalk. 
Dirt  accumulating  there  would  cause  the  base  of 
the  leaf  to  rot  off.  Dirt  would  injure  the  ear  by 
getting  down  between  the  tender  green  husks. 
The  guards  prevent  this.  Rain  flows  down  the 
leaf  trough.  The  stream  parts  at  the  guard,  runs 
down  the  swollen  joint  of  the  stalk,  and  trickles 
down  the  outside  of  the  sheath.  From  one  leaf 
to  another  it  leaps,  and  waters  the  roots.  Loosen 
a  number  of  leaves,  and  study  the  rain-guard. 
Study  them  on  the  outer  husks.  Pour  or  spray 
an  imitation  shower  on  the  top  of  a  corn  plant,  and 
see  the  course  of  the  streams  as  they  descend  to 


5O        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

the  roots.  See  the  accumulation  of  rubbish 
behind  each  rain-guard.  Note  the  close  fit  of  this 
process  to  the  swollen  joint  of  the  stem. 

Compare  a  green  plant  with  one  that  is  ripe  and 
yellowing.  Is  the  guard  still  doing  duty?  What 
effect  have  the  surface  hairs  on  the  water?  Does 
it  collect  in  drops,  as  on  an  oily  surface,  or  does 
it  spread? 

The  stalk. — The  swollen  rings  are  the  nodes  of 
the  stalk.  The  lengths  between  are  the  internodes. 

The  word  joint  is  used  for  both,  so  is  ambiguous. 
The  strength  of  the  stalk  is  in  the  short,  strong 
internodes  near  the  bottom.  The  slenderer,  longer 
ones  are  toward  the  top,  where  flexibility  is  re- 
quired rather  than  strength.  Below  each  node 
the  fibres  are  most  rigid,  but  they  are  found 
more  tender  toward  the  bottom  of  the  internode. 
In  this  tender  substance  growth  takes  place;  and 
all  the  internodes  of  the  stalk  are  able  to  grow  at 
the  same  time.  This  explains  the  remarkable 
speed  of  the  plant's  growth,  when  the  roots  are 
established  in  rich  mellow  soil.  Each  "joint" 
adds  to  its  own  length. 

Corn  goes  down,  sometimes,  before  a  severe 
wind  that  loosens  its  roothold.  The  chief  work 
of  erecting  the  prostrate  stalk  is  done  by  the  stout 
lower  internodes,  which  have  power  to  bend,  and 


BREAD    PLANTS  5! 

thus  lift  the  stalk.  Have  you  seen  corn,  "lodged" 
by  wind,  rise  again  in  a  short  time  ? 

The  corn  plant's  feeding  roots  are  fibrous  and 
shallow  in  rich  soil.  In  pulling  up  a  plant  we  tear 
them  loose,  and  leave  in  the  earth  the  delicate 
root-hairs.  Above  ground  a  set  of  special  roots 
spring  from  one  or  more  nodes  of  the  stalk.  These 
are  brace  roots,  stiff  and  tough,  provided  to  hold 
the  stalk  in  the  ground,  and  to  brace  it.  They  act 
as  anchors  as  well  as  props,  resisting  the  pull  and 
push  of  the  wind.  How  many  sets  of  brace  roots 
can  you  find  on  a  single  plant? 

The  farmer  tries  to  hill  the  soil  around  the  corn 
plants  with  his  cultivator  when  he  gives  the  last 
plowing.  He  knows  that  neither  system  of  roots 
can  do  its  work  without  a  good  grip  on  the  soil. 
The  deeper  the  roots  are,  the  firmer  the  plant 
stands,  and  the  better  its  chances  to  get  food  and 
water  in  abundance. 

KAFIR   AND    DURRA 

Two  sorghum  varieties  that  are  not  sugar- 
producers  have  come  to  be  extensively  grown  in 
the  semi-arid  regions  of  what  was  once  our  Great 
Plains.  The  merit  o*  these  canes  is  that  they 
thrive  in  spite  of  drought,  and  they  don't  seem  to 


52        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

mind  hot  winds  that  shrivel  the  corn.  The 
Kafir  has  its  head  erect;  the  Durra  hangs  its  head. 
Thus,  when  one  sees  a  field  of  stocky  canes,  like 
dwarf  species  of  corn,  the  close,  oval  heads  loaded 
with  seeds,  it  is  easy  to  tell  if  it  is  Kafir  or  Durra, 
the  bold  or  the  bashful  one,  the  South  African  or 
the  Egyptian  "corn." 

The  seeds  of  these  giant  grasses  are  rich  in 
starch,  and  in  the  Dark  Continent  are  used  as 
human  food,  as  well  as  fodder,  pasture,  and  dry 
grain  for  cattle.  It  was  a  shrewd  traveller  who 
brought  the  seeds  to  farmers  on  our  western  fron- 
tier where  each  soon  proved  itself  a  patient  grass 
in  a  trying  situation.  Instead  of  succumbing  to 
the  drought  and  heat,  the  immigrant  rolls  its 
leaves  up  into  the  smallest  compass,  and  calls  a 
halt  on  all  activities.  When  the  spell  of  weather 
passes,  and  rain  falls,  the  leaves  unroll,  and  growth 
goes  forward,  just  as  if  there  had  been  no  check. 

Kafir  has  a  reputation  as  poultry  food,  and 
ground  into  meal  is  a  valuable  part  of  the  ration 
of  fattening  stock.  The  "yellow  milo,"  a  dwarf 
durra,  is  a  great  fodder  crop  in  California  and  the 
hot,  dry  Southwest.  If  planted  thinly,  the  stalks 
will  "stool"  like  wheat,  thus  multiplying  the  crop 
by  increasing  the  number  of  stalks. 

A  half-grown  crop  of  durra  or  kafir  makes  good 


BREAD    PLANTS  53 

pasture,  but  the  full-grown  stalks,  even  when 
stripped  of  seed,  have  more  value  as  fodder. 
White-seeded  durra  is  called  "Jerusalem  corn." 
"Kafir  corn"  and  "  African  millet"  are  the  same 
thing.  The  color  of  the  seed  glumes,  or  hulls, 
give  the  names  to  different  varieties  of  kafir. 

During  any  check  in  growth  the  leaves  of  sor- 
ghums contain  a  poison,  hydrocyanic  acid,  that 
may  kill  cattle  that  eat  the  plant  during  this  time. 
When  the  fodder  is  dry,  the  danger  of  poisoning 
has  passed. 

MILLETS 

In  India,  millet  takes  the  place  of  rice  in  the  dry 
regions  of  that  vast  country.  A  great  abundance 
of  small  seed  is  borne  in  the  thick  spikes  of  certain 
robust  grasses  of  several  different  kinds.  In 
several  oriental  countries  the  food  of  the  people 
is  made,  to  a  considerable  extent,  of  millet  seed. 
We  know  nothing  about  how  it  tastes  and  looks, 
for  the  millets  here  are  raised  entirely  for  feeding 
to  cattle,  or  as  a  catch  crop  to  plow  under,  for  the 
enrichment  and  lightening  of  heavy  soils. 

Millets  are  ancient  grains,  the  first  that  man 
gathered  in  the  wild,  and  sowed  seed  of  to  get  a 
better  harvest  on  better  ground.  The  seed  is 
prepared  in  various  ways:  in  porridge  by  boiling 


54  THE    BOOK    OF   USEFUL' PLANTS 

the  grain  whole,  or  first  ground  into  meal.  Some- 
times it  is  eaten  raw;  sometimes  parched  and 
eaten  dry,  or  boiled  in  milk. 

Hungarian  grass,  a  fox-tail  millet,  is  a  good 
example  of  the  group  whose  seeds  are  borne  in 
compound  spikes,  each  full  as  a  heavy  bunch  of 
grapes,  and  crowded  on  the  central  stem,  forming 
a  long  head  that  the  stalk  cannot  hold  erect. 
Pearl  or  cat-tail  millet  holds  up  its  stiff,  bearded 
spike,  six  to  fourteen  inches  long,  on  a  stalk  that 
towers  to  a  height  of  from  six  to  fifteen  feet.  Such 
a  plant  can  produce  a  wonderful  amount  of  forage, 
and  it  may  be  cut  three  times  a  year  in  temperate 
climates.  Its  succulence  prevents  its  quick  curing 
as  hay,  and  the  quick  development  of  tough 
fibres  spoils  it  for  hay  if  left  till  ripe.  So  farmers 
test  the  new  plants  to  find  out  which  ones  are  best 
for  their  needs.  Millets  may  be  the  great  Amer- 
ican silage  crop  of  the  future.  They  promise  well 
for  pastures,  and  for  green  manure  to  sow  after  a 
grain  crop  has  failed.  The  mixed  bird  seed  sold 
for  canaries  contains  some  millet. 

Poultry  foods  are  enriched  by  an  addition  of 
Hungarian  and  Proso  millets,  both  large-grained 
and  as  rich  in  protein  as  wheat.  The  Prosos  are 
a  group  with  better  seed,  but  poorer  as  a  forage 
plant. 


BREAD    PLANTS  55 

BUCKWHEAT 

The  most  interesting  thing  about  buckwheat 
is  that  it  is  not  wheat,  nor  even  a  grain  or  grass. 
It  is  the  seed  of  a  plant  of  the  Smartweed  Family. 
We  all  know  this  pink-flowered  smartweed  that 
grows  in  swampy  ground,  and  the  knot-grass  that 
creeps  around  the  back  door.  The  dock,  sorrel, 
and  pieplant  belong  to  the  same  family.  Buck- 
wheat is  an  annual  with  slender,  branching  stem 
two  feet  high,  bearing  white  flowers  and  a  three- 
cornered,  starchy  "nut"  in  a  brown  hull. 

Because  the  seed  looks  like  a  beech  nut,  the  Old 
English  "buck"  (meaning  beech),  is  combined 
with  wheat,  which  originally  meant  white,  in  the 
name. 

The  triangular  kernel  is  white  and  rich  in  starch, 
though  deficient  in  other  elements,  and  therefore 
lower  in  food  value  than  the  true  grains.  Yet  it  is 
grown  extensively  in  many  countries  of  Europe 
and  Asia,  ground  into  coarse  meal,  and  made  into 
porridge  or  cakes.  The  buckwheat  cakes  of 
winter  mornings  in  the  northern  states  consume 
most  of  the  crop  raised  in  this  country.  Several 
millions  of  bushels  are  thus  used  annually  to  make 
our  "flapjacks." 

The  wild  buckwheat  grows  on  the  banks  of  the 


56        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

Amur  River  in  Manchuria,  whence  it  was  carried 
into  Europe  five  hundred  years  ago.  The  peas- 
ants of  Russia  raise  five  million  acres  of  it  each 
year.  It  has  the  advantage  of  hardiness,  and 
ability  to  grow  on  very  poor  soil.  Its  season  is 
short.  Sowed  after  oats  are  harvested,  it  makes 
a  crop,  in  some  seasons.  It  is  often  put  in  as 
catch  crop  to  plow  under  in  the  late  fall.  It 
ripens  in  the  latitude  of  Sitka,  Alaska,  even. 

Buckwheat  hulls  are  sold  as  packing  for  bulbs 
and  such  things. 

BREADFRUIT 

It  is  almost  too  much  to  believe  —  the  story  of 
bread  that  grows  on  trees !  But  people  who  travel 
in  tropical  countries  have  seen  and  eaten  this  won- 
derful fruit,  and  they  tell  us  that  the  story  is  not 
a  fable,  but  a  simple,  everyday  fact.  The  natives 
go  out  and  pick  loaves  of  bread  and  bake  them 
whole  among  the  hot  embers  of  outdoor  or  indoor 
fires.  Then  they  open  the  crust  and  find  the 
crumb  part  a  rich,  starchy  mass  that  tastes  to 
foreigners  like  mashed  potato  made  rich  by  the 
addition  of  plenty  of  cream. 

The  breadfruit  tree  now  grows  in  southern 
Florida,  and  bears  its  fruit  there.  So  it  is  not 


BREAD    PLANTS  57 

unlikely  that  we  can  all  see  the  plant  and  taste 
the  loaves  that  hang  like  melons,  as  large  as  one's 
head,  from  the  axils  of  the  huge,  glossy  leaves. 
They  are  like  the  big,  green  oranges  that  hang  on 
the  osage  orange  trees,  and  like  the  mulberries, 
which  are  made  of  a  great  number  of  tiny  fruits,  all 
grown  together.  These  three  fruits  I  mention  for 
the  reason  that  the  plants  that  bear  them  are  all 
near  relatives  in  a  big  botanical  family. 

The  breadfruit  tree  grows  to  be  thirty  or  forty 
feet  high  in  its  home  in  the  South  Sea  Islands. 
Its  blossoms,  like  those  of  many  other  plants,  are 
borne  separately,  the  fertile  ones  clustered  in 
globular  heads,  the  sterile  ones  in  club-shaped 
catkins.  When  the  fruit  ripens  its  surface  is 
rough  still,  for  the  huge  mass  is  covered  with  the 
aggregate  tips  of  all  the  fertile  flowers. 

The  cultivated  breadfruits  have  become,  like 
the  bananas,  practically  seedless.  The  soft  pulp 
is  fibrous  only  at  the  centre.  So  its  food  value' 
has  been  increased,  at  the  expense  of  the  seed- 
making  function  of  the  plant. 

One  of  the  romantic  chapters  of  horticulture 
is  the  adventure  of  Lieutenant  Bligh,  who  was 
commissioned  by  the  British  Government  to  go  to 
Tahiti  and  get  young  plants  of  the  breadfruit 
tree  and  take  them  to  planters  on  the  West  Indian 


58        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

Islands,  in  hopes  that  this  valuable  species  could 
become  established. 

The  good  ship  Bounty  got  the  cargo  of  plants 
loaded,  and  sailed  away,  but  the  lieutenant  was 
seized  in  mid-ocean  by  his  mutinous  crew,  who 
put  him  into  a  small  boat  and  set  him  adrift,  with 
a  sailor  or  two,  who  remained  faithful,  for 
his  company.  Back  the  Bounty  sailed  and  reached 
the  port  from  which  it  put  to  sea,  and  the  crew 
made  a  settlement  on  Pitcairn's  Island.  But 
the  plucky  Lieutenant  Bligh  lived  to  reach  Eng- 
land, and  to  head  another  expedition,  which 
succeeded  in  carrying  the  breadfruit  tree  into  the 
British  West  Indies,  where  it  succeeded,  and 
to-day  is  one  of  the  most  valuable  of  tropical 
fruits  grown  there. 

It  is  one  of  the  trees  that  grow  best  from  cut- 
tings made  from  new  shoots.  Unfortunately  the 
fruit  does  not  stand  shipping  as  well  as  the  cuttings 
and  young  trees,  by  which  the  species  has  been 
distributed  very  generally  in  the  tropics  of  all 
countries. 

Some  trees  feed  and  house  and  clothe  people. 
Certain  palm  trees  have  this  threefold  value  to 
the  human  race.  The  breadfruit  tree  is  another. 
The  inner  fibre  of  the  bark  of  young  trees  is  made 
into  cloth  used  for  garments.  The  wood  of  the 


BREAD    PLANTS  59 

trunk  is  used  in  canoe  and  house  building.  Seams 
of  boats  are  closed  with  a  glue  made  of  the  sticky, 
milky  juice  that  exudes  from  wounds  in  the  bark. 
The  fruit  is  often  piled  into  pits,  where  it  be- 
comes a  soft,  ill-smelling  mass.  But  it  still  is  a 
nutritious  food  when  baked.  The  better  way  to 
preserve  the  fruit  for  future  use  is  to  dry  thin 
slices.  These  slices  may  be  baked  as  they  are,  and 
eaten,"  or  first  ground  into  meal  and  made  into 
puddings  and  other  dishes. 

ARROWROOT   PLANTS 

The  starch  that  physicians  prescribe  for  children 
and  invalids  with  certain  forms  of  indigestion  is 
called  arrowroot.  It  is  fine-grained,  and  has  the 
peculiar  characteristic  of  gathering  into  little  balls 
when  a  pinch  of  it  is  rubbed  between  the  thumb 
and  finger.  Stirred  in  boiling  water,  it  forms  a 
clear,  odorless  jelly,  palatable  and  easily  digested, 
if  unadulterated  in  manufacture.  Under  the 
microscope  the  small  grains  are  distinctly  seen, 
and  it  is  very  easy  to  see  the  larger  grains  of  potato 
starch  with  which  the  more  expensive  arrowroot 
is  so  often  mixed. 

Bermuda  arrowroot  is  made  from  the  fleshy 
rootstocks  of  a  many-stemmed,  reed-like  plant 


60       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

five  feet  high.  Maranta  is  its  name.  It  grows 
wild  in  Guiana,  but  it  is  cultivated  in  most  tropical 
countries  now,  to  supply  the  demand  for  this  form 
of  starch. 

Maranta  is  a  great  crop  in  Bermuda,  where  the 
best  grade  of  arrowroot  is  made.  There  is  but  one 
factory,  and  here  each  step  of  the  process  of  manu- 
facture is  watched,  to  ensure  absolute  cleanliness. 
The  tubers  are  scrubbed  clean,  then  the  skin  is 
removed,  and  the  white  flesh  grated  and  washed 
in  many  waters.  The  damp  air  prevents  dust, 
and  the  water  used  is  caught  from  rains  that  fall 
on  the  white  roofs  of  coral  limestone  that  cover  all 
Bermuda  houses.  The  more  washings,  the  finer 
and  whiter  the  starch  that  settles  below  the  float- 
ing fibres  of  the  roots.  About  15  per  cent,  of 
the  pulp  washed  is  recovered  as  pure  starch.  This 
is  dried  under  white  gauze,  in  shallow  pans.  An 
average  crop  yields  14,00x5  pounds  of  tubers  per 
acre,  and  the  arrowroot  sells  for  about  50  cents  a 
pound  in  the  open  market,  ten  times  the  price  of 
the  same  article  made  carelessly  in  St.  Vincent, 
West  Indies,  and  grown  on  soil  not  so  good  for  the 
purpose  as  the  coral  rock  meal  of  Bermuda,  which 
produces  the  best  possible  tubers. 

Neither  the  pointed  rootstocks  nor  the  dart- 
shaped  leaves  give  the  name  of  arrowroot  to 


BREAD    PLANTS  6 1 

Maranta.  When  the  roving  botanist  first  saw  the 
root,  a  Mexican  Indian,  wounded  with  a  poisoned 
arrow,  dug  up  a  plant,  cut  into  a  tuber,  and 
applied  the  oozing  sap  to  the  spot  where  the  arrow 
pierced  the  flesh.  He  did  as  all  Indians  did  in 
that  region,  and  knew  no  other  use  of  the  plant 
than  to  furnish  this  antidote  for  poison.  It  is 
strange  that  the  German  name  for  this  plant, 
when  translated,  is  the  same.  If  a  German  travel- 
ler carried  home  the  plant  and  the  name,  nobody 
remembers  who  he  was,  and  when  it  happened. 

The  Maranta,  grown  in  all  tropical  countries, 
produces  arrowroot  that  is  known  in  commerce 
by  the  name  of  the  country  that  produced  it. 
Hence,  you  can  buy  Australian,  Natal,  or  Bermuda 
arrowroot,  and  so  on. 

One  of  the  important  recent  discoveries  is  that 
arrowroot  of  excellent  quality  is  made  from  the 
tubers  of  the  various  species  of  canna  —  our 
common  garden  and  park  ornamental  plant. 

Manihot  arrowroot  comes  from  the  fleshy  roots 
of  a  South  American  plant  with  a  milky,  poisonous 
juice.  When  this  starch  is  separated  from  the 
fibrous  tissues,  it  is  dried  and  becomes  a  white 
powder.  If  baked  on  hot  plates  as  it  dries,  it 
becomes  a  cake,  which  is  broken  into  small  bits, 
and  these  rounded  by  friction  on  each  other,  as 


62      THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

bits  of  hardened  clay  are  made  into  marbles.  We 
know  this  arrowroot  as  tapioca,  a  nutritious  food, 
very  good  for  babies  and  invalids.  Cassava  is  the 
common  name  of  this  tapioca  arrowroot  plant. 
Manihot  utilissima  ("most  useful"  Manihot)  is  its 
botanical  name.  "Manioc,"  and  "mandioca,"  are 
two  names  by  which  the  plant  is  known  in  South 
America,  its  native  country.  It  looks  like  the 
castor-oil  plant  as  it  grows,  its  stem  giving  off 
branches  in  threes.  The  fleshy  roots,  like  sweet 
potatoes,  are  often  six  to  eight  feet  long.  They 
are  poisonous,  if  eaten  fresh,  but  the  poison  is 
driven  out  by  heat  and  pressure. 

Sliced  and  dried,  then  rasped  or  ground,  they 
furnish  the  "cassava  meal,"  out  of  which  the 
cassava  cakes  of  the  tropical  countries  are  made. 
Cassava  bread  is  the  same.  Mixed  with  molasses 
and  fermented,  the  meal  is  a  part  of  an  intoxicat- 
ing drink. 

SAGO    PALM 

Pearl  sago  is  a  form  of  starch  much  like  tapioca, 
used  for  puddings,  and  various  foods  for  conva- 
lescents and  children,  because  it  is  a  form  of  starch 
that  is  easy  of  digestion.  It  does  not  come  from 
roots  nor  tubers,  as  much  starch  does,  nor  from 
seeds,  as  does  the  starch  made  from  corn  and  other 


BREAD    PLANTS  63 

grains.  It  is  obtained  from  a  number  of  palms, 
particularly  from  one  species. 

The  sago  palm  grows  in  the  East  Indies,  in 
swampy  ground  near  the  coasts.  For  fifteen  years 
it  grows  without  flowering,  the  stem  topped  by  a 
crown  of  feathery  leaves.  The  pith  of  the  stout 
trunk  is  surrounded  by  a  thick  rind,  and  when 
the  time  of  maturity  arrives,  it  is  simply  bursting 
with  rich,  starchy  material.  This  is  the  tree's 
reserve,  laid  up  for  use  in  sending  up  the  flower 
cluster  and  ripening  the  fruit.  Let  the  tree  keep 
to  its  natural  function,  and  the  rind  will  stand,  a 
hollow  shell,  the  leaves  dead  and  the  ripe  fruits 
fallen,  at  the  end  of  the  year  of  blossom.  It  is  the 
tree's  time  to  die. 

The  sago  palm  is  too  valuable  a  tree  to  be  left 
to  round  out  its  own  career  by  going  to  seed. 
Just  when  the  stem  is  loaded  with  starchy  pith 
the  sago  hunter  has  it  cut  down.  Systematically 
the  trunk  is  sectioned  and  then  split,  and  the  rind 
scraped  of  all  the  pith,  which  is  grated  to  a  pulp. 
Next,  the  pulp  is  worked  with  the  hands  in  troughs 
full  of  water,  until  all  the  starch  has  settled  to  the 
bottom,  and  only  dry  fibre  remains.  Separate 
washings  rid  the  starch  of  impurities,  and  it  is 
dried.  Now  it  is  ready  for  use  in  the  cakes  and 
soups  upon  which  the  natives  live. 


64  'THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL    PLANTS 

Sago  in  commerce  is  in  the  form  of  small  pellets. 
The  native  prepares  the  floury  starch  for  export 
by  working  it  up  in  a  paste  with  water.  Then  he 
forces  the  paste  through  a  sort  of  colander  or  sieve, 
and  it  dries  in  small  bits.  Different  sizes  have 
different  trade  names,  but  all  sago  is  the  same 
substance,  a  valuable  starchy  food. 


'  Forage  Plants 


,  CHAPTER  II 

GRASSES 

A  LARGE  part  of  the  animal  creation  is  made  up 
of  grass-eaters.  Carnivorous  creatures  live  upon 
the  grass-eaters.  So  the  saying:  "All  flesh  is 
grass,"  is  literally  true,  in  the  long  run.  The 
commonest  plant  in  the  world  is  grass.  It  covers 
the  bare  earth,  even  when  trees  and  other  larger 
plants  make  a  shade  over  it.  Grass  fills  in  the 
chinks,  and  makes  the  earth  green  and  beautiful, 
except  in  desert  places. 

The  Grass  Family  embraces  all  the  cultivated 
grains,  whose  seeds  make  flour  for  bread  of  many 
kinds.  It  covers  the  pasture  grasses  that  are  made 
into  hay  to  feed  stock  in  cold  winter  climates. 
The  blue-grass,  that  makes  Kentucky  famous,  and 
is  the  favorite  lawn  grass  in  all  our  cities,  is  a 
wild  species.  Its  nutritious  leaves  and  stems  make 
the  richest  kind  of  pasture  and  hay  for  stock. 

Timothy  and  red-top,  European  wild  grasses, 
we  cultivate  for  hay  and  pasture.  Each  country 
has  developed  its  own  types  of  forage  plants. 

67 


68        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

The  stems  of  grasses  are  round.  Three-cornered 
stems  belong  to  the  sedges,  which  are  more  near 
to  the  rushes,  that  grow  in  wet  ground.  Sedges 
are  woven  into  matting  by  the  Japanese.  Rush 
matting  is  made  in  many  countries. 

A  reed  called  Papyrus,  that  used  to  be  cultivated 
in  the  Delta  of  the  Nile,  was  more  important  in  the 
early  ages  of  civilization  than  it  is  now.  Sheets 
made  of  thin,  overlapping  strips  of  the  pith 
formed  the  first  paper  used  for  the  manuscript 
records.  Other  materials  have  quite  superseded 
Papyrus  in  the  manufacture  of  paper,  but  its  name 
is  preserved  for  all  time  in  our  English  word,  paper. 
We  see  the  plant  occasionally  in  water  gardens, 
and  in  pools  where  goldfish  live  outdoors. 

CLOVERS 

Grasses  include  the  cereals,  the  bread  plants  of 
the  world.  Because  they  furnish  rich  food  in  both 
forage  and  grain,  these  plants  are  great  soil  rob- 
bers. They  give  back  little  or  nothing.  The 
farmer  must  constantly  fertilize  his  fields,  or  the 
yield  of  grain  falls  off  deplorably.  Nitrogen  is  the 
most  needed  element.  It  can  be  bought  in  chemi- 
cal form  and  spread  on  the  land,  plowed  or 
allowed  to  wash  in,  and  the  crop  will  reward  the 


FORAGE    PLANTS  69 

farmer  by  increased  yield.  But  this  form  of  nitro- 
gen is  expensive.  It  averages  15  cents  a  pound 
—  a  high  price  to  pay. 

By  planting  some  nitrogen-gathering  plant  in 
rotation  with  l  his  grain  crops,  the  farmer  puts 
nitrogen  back  into  the  soil  at  a  merely  nominal  cost. 
Clover  is  one  of  the  best  soil  restorers.  It  is  a 
nutritious  pasture,  or  hay  crop.  Its  roots  go  deep 
and  pulverize  the  soil.  They  gather  nitrogen  and 
store  it  in  nodules  along  their  fibrous  branches. 
When  growth  ceases,  the  hay  is  cut  and  put  into 
the  barn;  those  nitrogen-laden  roots  are  left  to 
decay  and  enrich  the  soil  for  future  crops.  The 
surface  crop  is  worth  much,  for  its  nitrogenous 
content  is  high,  and  when  animals  fatten  on  it, 
much  of  its  value  is  twice  saved  by  careful  spread- 
ing of  the  stable  manure  on  the  fields. 

Four  fifths  of  the  air  is  nitrogen.  Clover  plants 
have  power  to  gather  this  element  and  store  it  in 
the  nodules  on  their  roots. 

Long  before  farmers  had  ever  seen  the  tubercles 
on  the  roots  of  legumes  (pod-bearing  plants)  they 
knew  that  clover  was  the  best  means  of  renewing 
worn-out  land  and  enriching  any  soil.  Fortu- 
nately, experience  was  their  guide,  though,  until 
very  recently,  they  followed  blindly.  One  of 
nature's  best  gifts  to  agriculture  is  this  group  of 


7O        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

plants  that  constantly  renews  the  soil's  fer- 
tility. 

Two  hundred  species  of  the  clover  are  known  to 
botanists.  The  hairy,  red  clover  we  know  as  a  hay 
and  seed  crop,  that  may  be  cut  early  for  hay  and 
late  for  seed  the  same  season.  In  pasture  it 
"runs  out"  in  two  or  three  years.  The  mammoth 
red  is  an  improved  kind. 

This  is  not  a  bee  pasture,  as  the  white  clover  is, 
because  the  tubes  of  the  little  flowers  are  too  deep 
for  the  honey-bee's  tongue  to  reach  the  sweets. 
The  bumble-bee  has  a  longer  tongue,  and  by  this 
insect  the  pollen  is  carried  that  insures  a  heavy 
yield  of  seed. 

The  bumble-bees  are  very  scarce  in  June,  when 
the  red  clover  comes  into  bloom.  In  late  summer 
the  clover  fields  swarm  with  these  insects.  Hence, 
the  farmer  makes  hay  in  his  clover  field  in  June, 
cutting  the  succulent  stems  when  they  are  in  the 
right  condition  to  make  the  best  hay,  which  is  too 
early  for  any  seed  to  be  ripe.  In  late  summer  he 
sacrifices  the  quality  of  the  forage  to  get  his  clover 
seed  at  the  time  that  is  ripe.  He  owes  this  heavy 
crop  to  the  bees,  though  he  may  not  know  this, 
any  more  than  they  do. 

Alsike,  or  Swedish  clover,  grows  well  on  land  too 
wet  for  the  red  clovers,  and  makes  superfine  hay, 


FORAGE    PLANTS  71 

pasture,  and  honey.  Its  small  heads  are  white, 
with  a  tinge  of  rose.  Its  stalks  are  slender  and 
branched.  The  honey-bees  have  no  trouble  in 
getting  the  nectar. 

White  clover  creeps  into  pastures  of  grass,  and 
lifts  its  small,  white  heads  on  long,  unbranched 
stems.  It  is  wild  all  over  this  northern  half  of  the 
United  States,  and  nobody  pays  much  attention 
to  it,  -as  a  rule. 

The  most  beautiful  species  is  the  crimson  clover, 
with  long,  crimson  heads  on  slender,  tall  plants. 
It  is  used  as  a  cover  crop  in  orchards,  and  as  forage, 
but  is  not  a  heavy  crop.  So  it  is  less  frequently 
sown  than  other  kinds.  It  grows  wild  in  parts  of 
southern  Europe,  and  is  a  staple  forage  crop  in 
parts  of  Italy. 

Berseem,  the  yellow-flowered  clover  of  Egypt,  is 
one  of  the  plants  recently  introduced  that  promises 
well  as  a  forage  crop  for  dry  regions  and  unprom- 
ising alkali  soils. 

Clovers  will  not  thrive  on  sour  soils.  Such 
must  be  sweetened  with  applications  of  lime. 
There  must  be  phosphorus  and  potash  added. 
Then  the  roots  pasture  greedily,  plow  the  soil, 
unlock  the  mineral  foods  the  earthy  particles  hold, 
and  make  the  soil  swarm  with  nitrogen-gathering 
bacteria,  so  that  it  is  literally  alive. 


72        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 
ALFALFA 

"Lucerne"  is  another  name  by  which  this  won- 
derful clover-like  plant  is  called  in  Europe,  but  in 
America  we  call  it  by  the  Arabic  name,  "alfalfa," 
which  means  "the  best  fodder."  That  name 
describes  it  exactly,  for  no  other  plant  yields  as 
much  and  as  good  hay. 

All  the  western  half  of  the  United  States  grows 
.alfalfa.  The  plant  has  brought  under  cultivation 
land  supposed  to  be  too  dry  to  grow  any  farm 
crop.  No  matter  if  the  region  has  scant  rainfall. 
The  farmer  cultivates  the  land  carefully,  prepara- 
tory to  seeding.  He  may  scatter  soil  from  another 
alfalfa  field  on  his  own  to  inoculate  the  soil.  He 
will  scatter  plaster  on  the  land  to  sweeten  any  sour 
patches.  Then  he  sows  the  alfalfa,  and  may  mow 
it  when  the  plants  are  several  inches  high  to  get 
rid  of  the  weeds  and  to  induce  the  alfalfa  plants  to 
"stool."  They  send  up  a  good  many  supple- 
mentary branches,  which  choke  out  weeds,  and 
cover  the  ground,  producing  an  abundance  of 
leaves. 

The  root  does  the  most  wonderful  thing.  It  is  a 
strong  tap  root,  and  it  goes  down  for  water.  Its 
many  branches  penetrate  the  soil,  loosening  it, 
and  making  it  spongy,  and  able  to  hold  the 


FORAGE    PLANTS  73 

moisture  it  receives  whenever  rain  falls.  It  is  not 
unusual  for  single  plants  of  alfalfa  to  have  roots 
fifteen  to  twenty-five  feet  long,  burrowing  down 
to  stores  of  moisture  that  no  shallow-rooted  plant 
could  get  at.  * 

Alfalfa  is  one  of  those  nitrogen-gathering  plants, 
extracting  the  most  precious  of  all  the  elements 
of  plant  food  from  the  air,  and  storing  it  in  nodules 
on  the  roots.  When  a  plant  dies  its  root  decays, 
and  the  soil  is  enriched  by  the  nitrogen  the  nodules 
set  free.  The  fibre  of  the  roots  makes  humus. 
The  roots  have  mellowed  the  deeper  subsoil,  and 
brought  up  plant  food  to  enrich  the  surface  soil 
for  other  plants.  If  the  plant  is  left  to  rot,  it,  too, 
adds  fertilizer.  But  usually  it  is  taken  off  in  the 
form  of  hay.  The  alfalfa  plant  gives  back  valuable 
elements  to  the  soil,  and  leaves  it  in  better  condi- 
tion for  the  growing  of  such  exacting  crops  as  corn 
and  wheat. 

Another  wonderful  fact  about  alfalfa  is  that  it  is 
perennial:  once  established,  it  continues  to  grow 
in  the  same  field,  without  "running  out,"  for  ten 
to  thirty  years.  And  each  year  two  to  seven 
cuttings  of  hay  are  made  from  the  same  field. 
An  average  cutting  yields  between  one  and  two 
tons  of  dry  hay.  The  average  yearly  yield  is  four 
or  five  tons  of  dry  alfalfa  hay  per  acre.  In'  all 


74        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

regions  it  goes  far  ahead  of  grass.  In  southern 
California  some  irrigated  fields  yield  ten  tons  to 
the  acre,  where  grass,  .with  the  same  care,  yields 
two  to  four  tons  only. 

Nothing  is  more  beautiful  than  a  field  of  alfalfa 
ready  for  cutting.  The  plants  stand  less  than  two 
feet  high,  covering  the  ground  with  a  velvet  carpet 
of  dark  green,  tinged  with  the  deep  blue  or  purple 
of  the  dense  flower  clusters,  just  beginning  to  show 
their  color.  The  plants  branch  thickly,  and  the 
abundant  foliage  is  made  of  clover-like,  three- 
branched  leaves.  A  single  flower  is  like  a  pea 
blossom,  and  each  ripens,  if  it  gets  a  chance,  an 
interesting  flat  pod  that  coils  itself  as  tight  as  a 
watch  spring. 

Alfalfa  hay  is  cut  when  the  flowers  bud,  and 
before  fibre  hardens  the  succulent  leaves.  Care- 
fully dried,  the  leaves  make  hay  that  is  at  its  best. 
The  leaves  are  very  rich  in  protein,  the  nitrogenous 
element  that  builds  flesh.  The  stems  and  flower 
clusters  are  nutritious,  too,  but  at  haying  time  it  is 
the  leaves,  which  shed  badly  if  not  properly  dried, 
that  the  farmer  is  most  concerned  about. 

Alfalfa  fields  make  rich  pastures,  but  hungry 
cattle  eat  too  much  and  get  sick,  if  they  have  their 
own  way.  Cattle-raisers  feed  the  hay  ground  up 
and  added  to  corn  and  bran.  Such  a  balanced 


FORAGE    PLANTS  75 

ration  is  an  exact  way  of  feeding,  which  is 
most  satisfactory.  Bags  of  this  alfalfa  meal  are 
shipped  more  economically  than  the  same  hay 
baled. 

I  have  eaten  very  palatable  bread  and  cakes 
made  of  alfalfa  flour  —  the  ground  seed.  It  is 
nutritious,  but  too  dark  colored  to  be  popular. 

Records  show  that  alfalfa  was  brought  into 
Greece  from  Persia  in  480  B.  C.  It  reached  Italy 
during  the  first  century,  and  slowly  spread  over 
Europe.  From  Spain  it  was  carried  to  Mexico 
and  thence  spread  north  and  south  during  the  six- 
teenth century.  New  England  got  seed  from  Eng- 
land about  the  same  time.  But  the  plants  died 
out  the  second  season,  and  culture  of  the  new  plant 
was  generally  ignored  by  farmers.  Only  recently 
has  it  been  restored  to  a  place  among  agricultural 
crops  in  the  East  by  the  discovery  that  soil  inocu- 
lation establishes  the  plant,  and  it  becomes  one 
of  the  best  crops  for  forage,  and  for  building  up 
depleted  farm  land. 

In  the  West,  alfalfa  is  the  great  forage  crop,  as 
it  is  in  southern  Europe.  Drought-resistant  vari- 
eties brought  from  Turkestan  are  grown  in  the 
semi-arid  regions  of  the  Great  Plains,  and  the 
desert  places  become  gardens.  Hardier  varieties 
have  extended  the  range  of  the  plant  farther  north. 


76        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

Sand  lucern  is  proving  just  the  thing  for  light, 
sandy  soil  in  the  north  central  states. 

The  growing  popularity  of  alfalfa  in  Kansas  is 
shown  by  the  fact  that  in  1891  the  crop  measured 
34,000  acres.  In  1907  it  was  743,000  acres.  The 
prejudice  of  farmers  is  strong  against  a  "new 
thing."  But  even  prejudice  must  surrender  when 
the  new  plant  multiplies  the  farm  income,  and 
at  the  same  time  improves  the  land. 


Sugar  Plants 


CHAPTER  III 
SUGAR-CANE 

TALLEST  and  most  valuable  of  all  grasses  is  the 
sugar-cane,  which  grows  to  a  height  of  twenty 
feet,  in  the  most  favorable  situations,  and  furnishes 
one  of  the  most  important  of  human  foods.  Its 
name,  Saccharum,  gives  us  a  root  for  words  that 
mean  sweet;  and  it  is  the  adjective  part  of  the 
Latin  names  of  several  other  plants  whose  sap 
yields  more  or  less  sugar. 

The  cane  is  very  much  like  maize  in  general 
appearance,  except  that  the  "joints"  are  shorter 
and  the  leaves  narrower.  When  the  time  of 
flowering  arrives,  the  stalk  is  topped  by  a  full,  oval 
plume,  like  that  of  pampas  grass.  The  sections 
of  the  stem  are  covered  by  a  tough  rind,  and  filled 
with  soft  pith,  strung  with  thread-like  fibres,  and 
saturated  with  the  sweet  sap.  The  time  when 
the  percentage  and  the  condition  of  sugar  is  best 
is  just  at  the  fading  of  the  flowers.  After  that 
the  plant  draws  upon  the  store  of  rich  sap  to  ma- 
ture the  seeds. 

79 


8O        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

The  grower  is  little  interested  in  seed-produc- 
tion. When  the  stalk  is  cut,  new  shoots  come  up 
from  the  roots  —  the  "ratoons,"  from  which  the 
new  crop  comes  —  sometimes  for  a  long  period  of 
years.  Another  means  of  getting  new  fields 
planted  is  setting  out  cuttings.  Any  joint  is  likely 
to  root,  if  planted,  and  it  may  send  up  a  number 
of  canes.  The  top  of  the  cane  is  always  deficient 
in  sugar,  and  best  for  making  cuttings.  This 
fortunate  combination  of  facts  enables  the  grower 
to  send  the  best  of  his  crop  to  the  sugar  mill,  and 
keep  back  the  part  of  the  canes  that  insures  the 
best  crop  next  year  in  the  new  field.  Two  joints 
to  a  cutting,  and  the  cuttings  set  out  in  a  horizon- 
tal position,  are  the  usual  methods  on  the  up-to- 
date  plantations. 

Only  in  the  tropics  does  the  cane  flower  at  all 
freely.  Many  of  the  varieties  grown  do  not  flower 
at  all.  This  condition  has  arisen  from  the  con- 
tinued propagation  of  new  plants  by  means  of 
cuttings  and  ratoons. 

A  plant  that  is  commercially  grown  in  all 
tropical  and  sub-tropical  countries  of  the  globe, 
by  peoples  ranging  from  civilization  down  to 
savagery,  receives  varied  treatment,  before 
and  after  completing  its  period  of  growth.  In 
general,  then,  we  can  speak  of  the  cultivation 


The  loaf  that  hangs  on  the  bread-fruit  tree  is  as  large 
as  a  man's  head 


I 


'  I 


SUGAR   PLANTS  8 1 

and  harvest  of  cane,  and  the  manufacture  of 
sugar. 

During  the  ten  months  between  the  planting 
and  harvesting  of  sugar-cane  it  is  kept  free  from 
weeds,  and  the  soil  mellow  to  retain  moisture.  The 
fields  must  be  irrigated  if  good  crops  are  demanded 
in  regions  of  insufficient  rainfall.  The  lower 
leaves  are  often  stripped  to  let  in  the  sun,  and 
make  the  canes  stand  up  better.  When  tests 
indicate  that  the  time  for  cutting  has  arrived,  the 
men  go  into  the  harvest  with  machetes,  or  other 
stout  knives.  The  stalks  are  cut  near  the  ground, 
for  otherwise  much  sugar  would  be  lost.  The 
part  of  the  field  earliest  to  get  a  start  in  spring  is 
the  one  earliest  ready  for  the  knife.  This  is  fortu- 
nate, for  the  canes  cut  must  be  crushed  in  the  mill 
soon  afterward,  or  they  will  quickly  deteriorate. 

The  growth  in  the  cane  brake  is  tremendously 
heavy,  and  for  this  reason  the  most  enlightened 
planters  take  advantage  of  inventions  that  carry 
the  canes  to  the  mill.  Barges,  if  water  is  near, 
trolleys,  lines  of  railroad  with  open  cars,  even 
flumes,  are  means  of  transportation  made  use  of 
to  save  expense  in  time  and  human  muscle. 

The  improvement  of  machinery  from  the  puny 
wooden  wheel  crushers,  driven  by  mule  or  buffalo 
power,  that  left  a  large  percentage  of  the  sugar  in 


82       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

the  stalks,  to  the  power  mills  that  get  almost  all, 
has  done  much  to  create,  as  well  as  supply,  the 
increased  demand  in  the  world  for  sugar  of  the 
highest  quality.  In  the  cane  mill  and  on  through 
the  sugar  factory  we  see  skilled  men  controlling 
the  machinery  that  converts  cane  sap  into  sugar. 
Few  processes  require  human  labor,  such  as  is  put 
into  the  business  in  countries  where  more  primi- 
tive methods  are  still  in  use.  The  improvements 
have  been  made  by  men  who  have  gone  into  warm 
countries  from  the  North,  and  taken  vigorous 
hold  of  the  business.  Teaching  the  easy-going 
inhabitants  the  use  of  machinery  has  been  a  chore. 

The  sap  of  the  cane  must  be  extracted  by  crush- 
ing and  rolling,  then  condensed  by  evaporating 
the  water  it  contains,  then  clarified  and  crystal- 
lized into  the  sugar  of  commerce. 

The  best  mills  get  95  per  cent,  of  the  sucrose 
(sugary  content)  of  the  cane.  This  process  begins 
with  the  carrier  that  brings  a  continuous  supply 
of  cane  to  the  shredding  knives.  The  torn  fibres 
go  to  the  crushing  rollers,  a  series  of  them,  that 
finally  leave  the  dry  fibre,  called  "bagasse"  in 
America.  This  is  burned  in  the  furnaces  for  fuel, 
or  saturated  with  the  sweet  residue  of  the  sugar 
vats,  and  sold  as  a  cattle  food  under  the  trade 
name,  "molascuit."  A  recent  use  for  the  fibre 


SUGAR    PLANTS  83 

is  as  a  filtering  material  for  the  clearing  of  the 
liquid  sugar. 

Vacuum  pans  rarefy  the  air  so  that  the  contents 
boil  at  a  low  temperature,  which  is  the  only  way  to 
keep  all  the  sucrose  in  the  chemical  state  to  crys- 
tallize when  the  proper  degree  of  condensation 
is  reached.  When  crystals  begin  to  form  in  the 
pan,  the  process  goes  forward  rapidly,  and  the  mass 
is  quickly  cooled,  and  the  crystallized  sugar,  in  a 
small  amount  of  liquid,  is  let  out  into  centrifugal 
separators,  with  fine  metal  gauze  in  their  linings. 
These  vessels  revolve  at  high  speed,  and  the 
molasses  flies  out  through  the  screens,  while  the 
granulated  part  of  the  sugar  remains  behind.  It  is 
just  as  we  see  it  in  the  markets.  If  the  molasses 
is  not  all  thrown  off,  we  have  a  moist  sugar,  in- 
stead of  the  granulated,  dry  kind. 

Molasses  is  made  by  heating  the  cane  juice  to  a 
temperature  that  converts  much  of  the  sucrose 
into  "invert  sugar,"  a  form  that  will  not  crystal- 
lize. So  sweet  and  rich  is  the  syrup  that  it  has 
great  food  value,  and  is  one  of  the  valuable  by- 
products of  sugar  making,  in  all  the  old  processes. 
Only  the  vacuum  pan  prevents  the  formation  of 
invert  sugar,  and  the  molasses  resulting  from  this 
process  is  almost  worthless  as  food.  The  fer- 
mentation of  this  low-grade  molasses  produces 


84       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

alcohol  fit  only  for  industrial  uses.  The  rich 
molasses,  diluted  with  water  and  fermented,  pro- 
duces rum. 

SORGHUM 

By  the  name,  Sorghum,  we  in  America  mean  the 
sugar-bearing  variety  of  the  species,  sorghum, 
which  is  big  enough  to  include  the  broom  corn  and 
the  kafir  and  durra,  inaccurately  called  corn  and 
millet. 

The  hard  times  that  kept  farmers  poor  in  the 
West  thirty  or  forty  years  ago,  made  sugar  a 
luxury  that  they  could  not  afford.  The  plant 
upon  which  a  good  deal  depended  in  those  times 
was  the  "amber  sorghum,"  from  which  sorghum 
molasses  was  made.  Every  farmer  planted  a 
small  patch  of  cane,  and  when  the  slender  stalks 
had  ripened  their  feathery  panicles  of  flowers,  they 
were  stripped  where  they  stood.  Then  they  were 
topped,  after  being  cut  down,  and  the  part  that 
contained  the  soft  pith,  saturated  with  sugar,  was 
hauled  to  the  mill.  This  was  a  crude  affair, 
installed  by  a  neighbor  who  ground  and  boiled  for 
the  community,  if  he  could  spare  the  time.  A 
crusher  consisted  of  steel  cylinders  between  which 
the  canes  were  fed,  while  a  horse  went  round  and 
round  to  furnish  the  power.  The  sap  was 
caught  below  the  crusher,  and  conducted  to  a 


SUGAR   PLANTS  85 

reservoir,  or  directly  to  the  evaporating  pan,  under 
which  a  fire  burned,  while  the  man  attending  it 
skimmed  the  boiling  liquid  to  get  rid  of  the  im- 
purities in  it.  Eight  gallons  of  juice  made  one  of 
heavy  syrup. '  The  strong  taste  was  partly  due 
to  the  leaf  fragments  and  other  foreign  matter 
that  made  25  per  cent,  of  the  crude  sap. 

To-day,  cheap  glucose  syrups  have  replaced 
the  molasses  of  frontier  memory.  But  they  are 
not  so  honest  as  the  darker,  heavier  molasses. 
The  gingerbread  and  molasses  cookies  of  our 
grandmothers'  day  cannot  be  equalled  by  any 
present-day  treacles.  The  farmer  affords  sugar 
now,  and  therefore  the  manufacture  of  molasses 
has  fallen  off  in  country  districts,  and  the  crushers 
rust  in  the  junk  heap. 

This  sorghum  came  originally  from  Africa  by 
way  of  Egypt,  and  an  importation  of  seeds  brought 
it  also  from  China,  to  be  tried  as  a  fodder  plant  in 
drought-stricken  regions  of  the  Southwest.  Here 
it  is  still  grown  for  forage  and  for  syrup.  Half- 
grown  canes  are  pastured  and  made  into  silage. 
It  out-crops  the  best  varieties  of  fodder  corn. 

SUGAR   BEETS 

A  number  of  vegetables  contain  a  noticeable 
amount  of  sugar.  The  onion  is  one  of  these. 


86        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

Peas  and  corn  are  sweet.  Stalks  of  corn  yield 
sugar.  Fruits  of  many  kinds  have  a  high  per- 
centage of  sugar.  Grains  and  root  vegetables 
must  also  be  counted,  and  the  sap  of  many  species 
of  trees. 

But  the  world's  supply  of  sugar  depended  from 
the  beginning  of  civilization,  and  probably  long 
before,  upon  the  sugar-cane  of  the  Tropics.  It  is 
not  strange  that  the  more  progressive  peoples  of 
temperate  regions  came  to  feel  a  fear  that  this 
important  foodstuff  might  fail,  in  time,  to  supply 
the  growing  demand.  Tropical  agriculture  is  not 
scientific.  Coolie  labor  produces  the  crop  of  cane, 
and  the  overseers  are  not  men  who  would  direct  a 
fight  against  a  new  disease  or  insect  enemy  of  the 
cane  as  men  of  colder  regions  would.  What  would 
a  sugar  famine  mean? 

The  question  confronting  the  scientist  and  the 
commercial  world  was  this:  Isn't  there  a  sugar 
plant  of  the  Temperate  Zones  to  take  the  place  of 
the  cane?  Nobody  could  name  one.  The  next 
question  was:  Cannot  a  sugar-producing  plant 
be  bred  up  to  fill  the  great  need? 

Germany  and  France  furnished  the  trained 
scientists  whose  patience  and  skill  solved  the 
problem.  Vegetables  of  various  sorts  were  tested 
for  sugar.  Beets  were  found  that  tested  as  high  as 


SUGAR    PLANTS  87 

3  per  cent,  sugar.  It  was  decided  to  work  for 
the  improvement  of  the  beet  as  a  sugar  plant. 

Seed  of  the  plants  that  gave  the  highest  sugar 
test  were  saved  and  planted.  The  new  crop  was 
carefully  examined,  and  only  those  saved  to  pro- 
duce seed  which  had  most  promise.  Again  and 
again  the  process  of  seed  selection  was  repeated, 
and  very  gradually  the  sugar  content  rose.  The 
establishing  of  beet-sugar  mills  and  the  perfecting 
of  processes  of  extracting  and  refining  the  product 
did  not  interfere  with  the  work  of  improving 
the  strains  of  sugar  beets.  It  is  still  practised. 
Every  beet  seed  grower  with  enterprise  is  at  this 
work,  bringing  the  strain  he  sells  to  a  higher  sugar 
content.  The  average  per  cent,  has  doubled  in 
the  past  hundred  years.  Individual  beets  have 
tested  as  high  as  25  per  cent.  That  means  one 
quarter  of  the  beet's  weight  is  sugar.  Fields 
have  averaged  14  per  cent. 

Beets  are  furnishing  to-day  a  large  part  of  the 
sugar  of  the  world.  The  amount  of  sugar  con- 
sumed has  greatly  increased  within  fifty  years, 
so  it  is  fortunate  that  a  second  source  of  the  raw 
material  for  its  manufacture  has  been  found. 
Europe  is  far  ahead  of  America  still  in  the  beet- 
sugar  industry.  California  and  Colorado  are  the 
chief  sugar-producing  states.  The  natural  advan- 


88        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

tages  of  a  mild  climate  with  plenty  of  sunshine 
give  California  the  advantage.  The  beets  contain 
a  higher  percentage  of  sugar  than  those  of  any 
other  country.  The  season  lasts  practically 
throughout  the  year,  which  keeps  the  mills  busy, 
and  a  vast  army  of  workers  continuously  em- 
ployed. 

The  beets  are  planted  in  rows  with  a  drill,  and 
carefully  tilled.  They  are  dug  by  machines,  but 
hand  work  is  required  to  cut  off  the  tops  with  the 
leaves  attached.  Slicing  by  machinery  follows. 

The  pulp  left  after  the  sugar  has  been  extracted 
is  put  down  in  silos,  or  fed  fresh  to  cattle.  The 
molasses  is  converted  into  alcohol. 

SUGAR   MAPLES 

The  making  of  sugar  from  cane  and  beets 
requires  elaborate  machinery.  It  is  no  simple 
home  industry.  But  anybody  who  has  a  few 
sugar  maple  trees,  and  a  fair  amount  of  patience, 
can  make  maple  sugar  as  good  as  any.  The  rich, 
sugary  sap  begins  to  flow  early  in  the  year.  Holes 
are  bored  into  the  saturated  wood  to  lead  it  out 
into  buckets.  The  hollow  drainpipes  first  used 
were  "spiles,"  made  of  the  large-pithed  elder-bush, 
and  driven  into  the  holes  as  they  were  bored. 


SUGAR   PLANTS  89 

Now  spouts  of  tin  or  galvanized  iron  are  used. 
Drip,  drip,  falls  the  sap  into  the  buckets,  and  every 
day  it  is  gathered  for  boiling.  The  trees  may  run 
for  some  weeks. 

Maple  sugar  has  a  peculiarly  delicate  flavor, 
that  adapts  it  for  use  in  the  making  of  fancy 
desserts  and  confectionery.  In  the  markets  it 
commands  a  price  far  higher  than  cane  or  beet 
sugar,  even  when  dark  in  color  and  strong  in  flavor. 
Constant  boiling  of  the  syrup,  and  faithful  skim- 
ming produces  the  best  quality  of  sugar,  and  the 
lightest  color.  Much  of  the  year's  crop  is  sold  as 
syrup,  canned  before  it  reaches  the  density  re- 
quired for  crystallization. 

A  delightful  variation  from  the  gritty  brick 
sugar  and  the  syrup  is  maple  cream,  a  smooth, 
fine-grained,  almost  white  paste,  made  by  stirring 
heavy  syrup  with  a  wooden  paddle. 

The  hard  or  sugar  maple,  and  a  closely  related 
species,  or  variety,  called  the  black  maple,  are 
the  two  principal  sources  of  maple  sugar.  It  is, 
therefore,  an  American  product,  bound  to  dwindle 
in  amount  from  year  to  year  by  reason  of  the 
cutting  off  of  the  forests  in  the  northern  tier  of 
states.  Vermont  and  Ohio  are  perhaps  the  largest 
producers  now.  The  maintenance  of  hard  maple 
groves  will  always  interest  a  few  people  who  supply 


9O       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

their  own  needs  in  this  way.  Canada  makes  a 
good  deal  of  maple  sugar  still. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  the  savages  of  our 
northern  woods  supplied  themselves  with  maple 
sugar,  just  as  the  tropical  savages  get  this  needed 
food  from  palm  trees  and  sugar-cane. 

Soft  maples  yield  sugar,  but  not  in  quantities 
that  pay  for  the  hard  work  of  evaporating  their 
thin  sap. 


Plants  Whose  Seeds  We  Eat 


CHAPTER  IV 
BEANS 

THE  person  who  "doesn't  know  beans"  is 
counted  a  stupid  one.  You  and  I  know  the  little 
white  dry  beans  that  began  to  be  grown  as  a  field 
crop  to  supply  our  army  during  the  Civil  War. 
This  is  the  bean  that  supplies  our  navy,  too,  and 
one  name  of  it  is,  "Navy  bean"  Boston  bakes 
this  bean,  and  it  is  a  staple  food  for  man  and 
beast. 

We  know  the  garden  beans  whose  pods  we  eat 
— snap  and  butter  beans — beans  that  grow  in  bush 
form  and  others  that  climb  poles.  All  these 
kinds  are  sprung  from  one  species,  probably 
native  to  South  America,  and  spread  to  India, 
Egypt,  Asia  Minor,  and  Europe,  following  the 
Spanish  invasion  of  Peru.  The  general  name, 
kidney  bean,  is  applied  to  this  group,  varieties  of 
which  are  the  food  that  substitutes  for  meat  in 
warm  countries,  swarming  with  a  great  population. 

We  know  Lima  beans,  the  broad-podded,  flat 
kind,  bigger  than  the  kidney.  It  is  a  separate 

93 


94        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

species,  called  lunatus,  the  moon-shaped  bean, 
credited  to  South  America,  and  named  for  the 
city  of  Lima,  the  Peruvian  capital.  It  has  bush 
and  pole  varieties,  and  some  especially  delicate 
dwarf  kinds  have  been  derived  from  the  original 
large-seeded  species. 

The  scarlet  runner  is  a  distinct  species,  grown 
chiefly  as  an  ornamental  vine,  that  covers  trel- 
lises and  porches  with  its  abundant  flower- 
clustered  tendrils,  vigorous,  bright  foliage,  and 
wholesome  seeds,  that  are  good  to  eat,  in  the 
green  pods  or  dry.  In  this  country  they  are 
rarely  used  for  food. 

We  in  America  do  not  know  the  broad  bean  of 
Europe  and  Asia,  unless  we  live  in  Canada,  where 
this  rich  vegetable  is  grown  to  mix  with  fodder 
corn  in  making  ensilage.  The  whole  plant  is 
rich  in  nitrogen,  and  it  goes  into  the  silo,  leaving 
the  roots  with  their  store  of  nitrogen  in  the  tuber- 
cles, to  fertilize  the  soil.  The  dry  beans  are  used 
in  the  old  countries  as  cattle  food.  Usually  they 
are  ground  into  meal  and  mixed  with  coarser,  less 
concentrated  food.  Housewives  put  down  pod 
beans  of  different  sorts  in  brine  for  winter  use. 
The  custom  is  an  old  one  in  England,  Germany, 
and  the  Low  Countries.  Though  a  coarse  vege- 
table fare,  beans  are  almost  one  fourth  protein,  or 


PLANTS    WHOSE    SEEDS    WE    EAT  95 

muscle-making  food.  They  also  contain  oil, 
which  is  a  heat-producing  food,  suited  for  people 
who  work  outdoors  in  cold  weather. 

We  are  beginning  to  know  the  strange  Soy,  or 
Soja,  bean  frdm  Japan  and  China,  a  native  of 
these  countries,  and  cultivated  there  and  in  India 
for  centuries  unnumbered,  as  a  food  for  man.  It 
is  more  like  a  pea  than  a  bean;  the  seed  and  the 
whole  plant  are  rich  in  nitrogen.  They  are  used 
for  stock  food,  and  plowed  under  to  enrich  the 
soil.  Cowpeas  are  very  like  Soy  beans,  and  put 
to  the  same  uses. 

In  Mexico  and  farther  south  the  little  dark  beans, 
called  frijoles,  are  a  common  food  of  the  people, 
as  the  horse  beans  are  in  the  warm  countries  of 
Europe. 

PEAS 

Fully  as  ancient  as  the  bean,  as  human  food,  is 
the  pea,  records  of  whose  cultivation  are  found 
in  the  lake  dwellings  of  Switzerland  and  Savoy, 
and  in  the  early  classic  writings.  No  mention  of 
peas  is  made  in  •  the  records  of  early  times  in 
India  or  Egypt.  So  the  fact  that  wild  peas  still 
flourish  in  Mediterranean  countries  is  taken  by 
botanists  to  mean  that  this  region  is  the  ancestral 
home  from  which  one  of  the  most  valuable  garden 


96        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

and  field  crops  of  the  world  has  spread  through  the 
temperate  regions,  everywhere. 

Field  peas  are  grown  as  a  green  and  a  dry  crop 
for  stock,  as  pasture,  ensilage  and  as  green  manure. 
Foreigners  are  not  above  eating  them,  but  we  feel 
squeamish  about  it,  though  as  split  peas  we  do 
consume  in  soups  field  peas  without  knowing  it. 

Garden  peas  are  more  delicate  and  sweet,  and 
we  consider  these,  in  a  multitude  of  varieties, 
among  the  choicest  and  most  nutritious  of  all 
vegetables.  Quantities  are  canned  commer- 
cially, the  smallest  being  the  most  expensive,  the 
petit  pois,  of  French  cookery.  We  must  believe 
that  the  sifting  out  of  imperfect,  undeveloped 
seeds  of  standard  canning  varieties  supply  a 
product  that  is  inferior,  and  yet  this  grade  often 
poses  as  the  imported  article  from  France. 

A  tremendous  acreage  is  planted  to  peas  as  a 
market  garden  crop.  The  gardeners  of  all  coun- 
tries grow  them  for  home  use.  They  are  a  great 
crop  for  soil  renovation,  and  for  green  manure  in 
young  orchards. 

The  sugar  peas  have  sweet,  edible  pods,  and 
are  used  as  snap  beans  are.  Among  the  numer- 
ous varieties,  those  that  have  wrinkled  seeds  are 
sweeter  and  have  less  starch  than  those  that  are 
globular  when  dry. 


b 


Garden  peas  are  a  hardy  and  prolific  race 


PLANTS    WHOSE  SEEDS    WE    EAT  97 

Sweet  peas  are  a  race  developed  for  their  blos- 
soms alone. 

LENTILS 

One  of  the  oldest  food  plants  that  supplies  in 
satisfying  quantities  the  muscle-building  ele- 
ments is  the  lentil,  a  puzzle  to  the  botanist,  but 
cultivated  by  men  as  far  back  as  the  Bronze  Age. 
We  are  familiar,  perhaps,  with  the  little,  dark, 
flattened  seed,  that  the  grocer  keeps  chiefly  for 
his  customers  of  the  Latin  races.  They  have  no 
prejudices  against  foods  that  are  dark-colored 
and  have  a  strong  taste.  We  can  buy  canned 
lentils,  ready  to  eat,  and  learn  what  they  taste 
like,  or  make  soup  of  the  dry  seeds  that  act  and 
look  like  small,  dark  split  peas. 

Any  vegetable  that  has  saved  the  race  from 
famine,  and  came  with  the  Aryan  civilization  into 
Europe,  and  on  to  this  country,  is  one  worth  know- 
ing, from  a  historical  standpoint,  if  from  no  other. 
There  are  so  many  legumes  far  more  useful,  how- 
ever, that  it  will  be  surprising  if  the  lentils  should 
not  decline  with  the  advance  of  civilization  in  the 
years  to  come. 

The  lupines  and  vetches,  pod-bearing  plants 
once  important  as  food  for  cattle,  have  value,  but 
better  forage  plants  will  surely  beat  them  in  the 


98        THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

race.  Some  species  may  fit  peculiar  situations, 
and  be  improved  for  this  purpose.  But  only  the 
fittest  plants  survive  in  the  new,  intelligent  agri- 
culture that  is  coming  on. 

PEANUTS 


The  young  gardener  who  plants,  just  for  fun,  a 
peanut  or  two,  to  see  what  the  plant  looks  like, 
realizes,  when  it  comes  into  bloom,  that  he  has 
something  that  might  easily  be  mistaken  for  a 
bushy  bean  or  pea  plant,  with  lower  branches  that 
creep  along  the  ground  in  all  directions.  The 
familiar  pea  blossoms  settle  the  question  of  the 
family  before  the  seed  shows.  The  plant  is  a 
pod-bearer.  Its  fruit  is  not  a  true  nut  at  all. 

Another  discovery  that  pleases  the  average  boy 
and  girl  is  this :  the  peanut  will  grow  almost  any- 
where in  this  country,  and  produce  plenty  of 
"nuts."  What  a  tremendous  saving  of  nickels 
and  dimes !  For  who  goes  out  for  a  holiday  with- 
out patronizing  the  peanut  man,  whose  neat  little 
pushcart  whistles  cheerily  on  the  street  corner? 
Mothers  would  much  rather  have  their  hungry 
children  comforted  with  a  bag  of  warm,  fresh- 
roasted  peanuts  on  the  ride  home,  than  with 
sweets  that  are  made  of  she  knows  not  what. 


PLANTS    WHOSE    SEEDS    WE    EAT  99 

The  peanuts  are  wholesome  food,  nourishing,  as 
well  as  tasty,  and  they  are  shelled  as  eaten,  which 
means  that  they  have  not  been  crawled  over  by 
flies.  They  are  easily  handled  and  do  not  mess 
one's  clothes  and  hands. 

Grown-up  people  are  as  fond  of  peanuts  as 
children,  and  frankly  buy  and  eat  them  even  in 
public  places,  if  they  feel  so  inclined.  The  more 
particular  people  will  take  them  home  where  they 
can  enjoy  them  with  the  rest  of  the  family. 

A  more  recent  use  of  the  nuts  —  roasting  them 
in  butter  or  oil  —  makes  an  appetizing  dish. 

Peanut  butter  is  a  comparative  novelty,  made 
by  grinding  the  roasted  nut  to  a  paste.  It  will 
not  supersede  butter  made  from  cream,  though 
many  people  use  less  of  the  latter  since  they  have 
learned  to  like  peanut  butter  on  bread. 

Peanut  oil  is  extracted  from  the  nuts  and  used 
in  cooking,  and  as  a  salad  oil.  At  first  the  taste 
of  the  peanut  was  in  it,  but  refining  has  taken  that 
away.  The  great  mill  at  Marseilles,  supplied 
from  the  fields  of  Spain,  India,  and  North  Africa, 
was  long  the  chief  manufacturing  plant  for  pea- 
nut oil,  but  now  mills  are  being  established  in 
peanut-growing  states. 

We  eat  cottonseed  oil  that  has  travelled  to 
Europe  and  comes  back  labelled  "olive  oil."  No 


IOO  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

doubt  much  "pure  Lucca  oil"  we  buy,  and  pay 
very  high  prices  for,  is  made  chiefly  of  peanuts  and 
other  things  not  so  good.  The  sooner  we  are 
willing  to  take  our  honest  products,  the  oil  of 
cottonseed  and  peanut,  on  their  own  merits,  the 
less  we  will  have  to  pay  for  these  foodstuffs. 
Then  we  shall  cease  to  pay  tribute  to  pirates  who 
call  by  the  name,  olive  oil,  a  table  oil  that  is  not 
genuine,  but  adulterated.  It  is  time  we  laughed 
at  them:  so  long  have  they  laughed  at  our  boast 
that  we  will  have  nothing  but  the  genuine  article, 
and  that  we  are  able  to  detect  the  first  attempt 
to  cheat  us  by  substitutions. 

Let  us  take  a  long  look  backward  to  see  how  it 
came  about  that  the  peanut  is  the  principal  nut 
used  in  America  to-day.  We  do  not  have  so 
long  a  way  to  go  to  find  a  day  when  people  out- 
side of  a  small  section  of  Virginia  knew  nothing 
about  the  "goober  pea,"  so  well  liked  by  the 
people  around  Norfolk,  where  the  light,  sandy 
soil  was  commonly  planted  to  this  crop.  In  the, 
early  sixties,  when  the  northern  armies  were  in 
Virginia,  the  boys  in  blue  from  many  sections  of 
the  country  fell  in  love  with  the  nuts  that  were  a 
food  as  well  as  a  kind  of  dainty,  and  lent  pleasant 
variety  to  the  hard  fare  of  the  soldier  life.  They 
could  keep  a  supply  on  hand,  and  even  on  the 


PLANTS    WHOSE    SEEDS    WE    EAT  IOI 

march  found  a  pocketful  no  burden,  and  often  a 
great  boon. 

It  was  the  soldier  mustered  out  at  the  end  of 
the  war  that  sent  back  to  Virginia  for  seed,  and  he 
planted  peanuts  on  his  farm  to  let  the  home  folks 
taste  that  "goober"  he  had  talked  so  much  about. 
So  the  northern  peanut  appetite  was  a  by- 
product of  the  War  of  the  Rebellion. 

The  centre  of  peanut  culture  is  still  near  its 
starting  point,  Virginia.  North  Carolina  and 
Virginia  each  raise  over  four  million  bushels  a 
year.  Georgia  raises  half  as  many.  Thirty- 
eight  states  can  grow  goobers.  The  crop  brings 
over  ten  million  dollars  a  year.  We  Americans 
eat  all  the  nuts  we  raise,  and  import  quantities 
beside  from  Spain,  and  from  China  and  Japan! 
We  certainly  have  the  peanut  habit! 

There  will  come  a  day,  perhaps,  when  we  grow 
all  our  peanuts  at  home.  It  is  expensive  to  bring 
them  from  abroad.  The  Pacific  coast  has  begun 
to  grow  great  crops  in  the  sandy  soil  of  the  Great 
Valley  of  California.  Home-grown  nuts  will  soon 
supply  the  market  on  this  side  of  the  mountains. 
Texas  is  growing  stupendous  crops  of  Spanish 
varieties,  which  yield  three  times  as  much  as 
the  Carolina  and  Virginia  fields  average,  by  the 
easy-going  methods  of  culture  in  use.  Tennessee 


IO2  THE    BOOK    OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

is  another  of  the  eight  states  which  grow  peanuts 
seriously  as  a  big  money  crop. 

The  botanist  has  gone  farther  than  we  have  in 
tracing  the  peanut  to  its  original  home.  How 
did  it  come  into  Virginia,  and  when?  The  records 
say  it  was  the  chief  food  supplied  on  "slavers"  to 
the  natives  of  Africa  on  their  way  to  America, 
and  the  auction  block  where  they  were  offered  for 
sale.  So  the  peanut  and  the  negro  came  together 
from  Africa  in  early  colonial  days.  We  have 
already  mentioned  India,  Africa,  and  Spain  as 
countries  that  export  the  nuts.  Brazil  is  con- 
sidered the  original  home  of  the  peanut,  because  a 
half  dozen  species  of  the  genus  grow  wild  in  that 
great  region.  Taking  the  botanist's  word  for  it, 
we  recognize  in  the  humble  "ground-nut,"  a  cos- 
mopolite, whose  traveh  have  satisfied  it  that 
North  America  is  a  good  country  to  settle  in. 

The  most  interesting  thing  about  the  peanut 
plant  is  the  way  the  blossoms  look  and  act.  The 
foliage  is  thick,  but  the  leaves  do  not  conceal  the 
showy,  yellow  flowers  that  fade,  one  after  another, 
and  do  not  bear  a  single  seed!  The  flowers  that 
"mean  business"  are  almost  too  small  to  see  at  all. 
They  do  not  open,  and  have  no  showy  color. 
As  soon  as  they  are  fully  grown  they  tuck  their 
pointed  tips  into  the  ground,  and  work  out  of 


PLANTS    WHOSE    SEEDS    WE    EAT  103 

sight.  Unless  they  do  this  the  nuts  will  not  de- 
velop and  ripen. 

When  the  autumn  comes,  the  plant  is  still 
flowering,  and  the  grower  hates  to  pull  up  a  plant 
that  has  not  finished  bearing.  But  he  does  it. 
The  late  flowers  form  small  nuts  at  best,  and  it  is 
dangerous  to  take  chances  of  an  early  frost  that 
will  damage  the  vines  and  interfere  with  the  cur- 
ing of-the  nuts. 

A  furrow  is  plowed  to  throw  the  earth  away 
from  the  row  on  each  side,  and  the  plants  are  then 
lifted  with  forks,  and  the  dirt  shaken  off  the 
clustered  nuts  massed  among  the  roots.  Long 
windrows  of  the  loaded  plants  are  gathered  up  by 
gangs  of  harvesters,  and  shocked  around  poles  set 
firmly  in  the  ground.  The  nuts  are  faced  inward, 
so  that  they  are  protected  by  the  tops,  and  a  cap 
of  grass  roofs  them  from  the  rain.  When  dried 
the  nuts  are  picked  by  hand  or  threshed  out  by 
machinery,  cleaned  of  sand  and  rubbish,  bleached, 
if  they  are  discolored,  and  sent  to  market. 

The  chemist  has  told  farmers  some  startling 
things  about  the  peanut.  They  are  full  of  meaning 
and  interest  to  us  all.  It  would  pay  to  grow  pea- 
nuts even  if  we  never  harvested  the  nuts,  because 
the  plant  is  one  of  those  nitrogen-gatherers,  which 
absorbs  that  most  valuable  of  all  plant  foods, 


104      THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

nitrogen,  from  the  air  that  is  in  the  soil,  and  stores 
it  in  nodules  on  the  roots,  and  in  the  stems  and 
leaves.  Plowing  under  such  a  crop  adds  to  the 
soil  the  best  possible  green  manure.  After  the 
nuts  are  taken  off  the  dry  plants  are  as  rich  stock 
food  as  clover  hay.  The  hulls  of  the  nuts  are 
better  than  coarse  hay.  The  cake  left  after  press- 
ing the  oil  out  of  the  nuts  is  as  good  for  fattening 
stock  as  cottonseed  meal  and  linseed  meal.  It  has 
three  times  the  richness  of  corn.  All  kinds  of 
stock  like  the  taste  of  peanuts,  and  thrive  on  the 
food,  green  or  dry. 

The  farmer  has  every  reason  to  bless  the  slave 
trader  who  imported  the  peanut,  for  it  brings  mill- 
ions of  dollars  to  his  pocket  every  year,  and  the 
refuse  feeds  his  stock,  which  makes  it,  indirectly, 
a  money  crop.  The  elements  of  nitrogen,  phos- 
phoric acid,  and  potash,  in  which  the  plant  is  rich, 
finally  go  back  to  the  soil  in  the  barnyard  manure, 
thus  saving  money  which  would  otherwise  have 
to  be  spent  for  other  fertilizers. 

ALMONDS 

Strangest  of  all  the  stone  fruits  is  the  almond, 
for  its  flesh  dries  away  into  a  leathery  husk  that 
cracks  open  when  ripe  to  free  the  pit.  We  do  not 
throw  away  the  pit  of  the  almond  as  we  do  that  of 


PLANTS   WHOSE    SEEDS   WE    EAT  IO5 

other  stone  fruits,  for  it  is  good  to  eat.  Almonds 
are  among  our  most  wholesome  and  most  delicious 
nuts. 

Two  kinds  of  almonds  are  grown,  the  sweet  and 
the  bitter.  The  first  is  the  edible  one;  the  second 
yields  a  flavoring  extract  used  in  cookery  and  in 
perfumes.  The  pits  are  ground  and  mixed  with 
water.  The  oil  that  contains  the  peculiar  flavor 
is  then  steam-distilled,  and  afterward  freed  of  its 
poison,  hydrocyanic  acid. 

The  paper-shelled  sweet  almond  is  the  one  the 
market  demands,  so  it  is  the  principal  kind  raised. 
It  has  been  produced  by  careful  selection  from  the 
stubborn,  hard-shelled  kinds  first  derived  from 
the  wild  almond  of  the  Mediterranean  countries. 
Sweet  almond  oil  is  an  article  obtainable  in  drug 
stores. 

The  flower  of  the  almond  trees  is  like  that  of  the 
peach,  and  for  this  reason  the  tree  has  been  planted 
as  an  ornamental  wherever  it  is  hardy.  The  trees 
bear  fruit  only  in  warm  climates.  In  this  coun- 
try the  greatest  areas  devoted  to  the  cultivation 
of  the  sweet  almond  are  in  the  high  coast  valleys 
of  central  California.  The  bulk  of  the  trade  is 
still  supplied  from  the  old  almond-growing  coun- 
tries of  Europe:  Spain,  France,  and  Italy  lead- 
ing. Morocco  ranks  with  them. 


106       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

When  the  nuts  are  ripe,  the  husks  split  open. 
Then  the  branches  are  shaken  or  beaten,  the  fruit 
dropping  on  canvas  spread  under  the  tree.  The 
almonds  are  hulled  by  machinery,  and  then  dried, 
and  bleached  by  sulphur  fumes.  This  process 
is  foolish  in  the  extreme,  as  it  may  spoil  the  flavor 
of  the  nuts  if  any  miscalculation  is  made.  The 
shell  easily  discolors  if  it  stays  on  the  tree  later 
than  the  time  the  husk  breaks.  Since  shell  dis- 
coloration hurts  the  sale,  bleaching  is  resorted  to. 
The  Public  pays  the  price  of  this  extra  process, 
because  it  imagines  that  almonds  are  not  first 
class  unless  they  have  bright  yellow  shells! 

AMERICAN   WALNUTS 

A  dozen  different  kinds  of  valuable  trees  belong 
in  the  family  of  the  walnuts  and  hickories.  They 
are  fruit  trees,  for  most  of  them  bear  edible  nuts  — 
pecans,  English  walnuts,  and  shagbark  hickory 
nuts,  for  examples.  They  are  noble  shade  and 
valuable  lumber  trees.  So  they  have  been 
planted  and  highly  esteemed  from  the  time  that 
men  first  began  to  use  the  fruit  and  the  wood 
of  trees. 

The  Black  Walnut  bears  globular  nuts,  wrapped 
in  spongy  husks,  smooth  and  green,  like  little 


PLANTS   WHOSE    SEEDS   WE    EAT  IO7 

oranges,  clustered  on  the  ends  of  twigs,  and  sur- 
rounded by  whorls  of  the  long,  compound  leaves. 
In  fall  these  fruits  drop  and  the  husks  soften 
and  break,  but  the  hard  sculptured  nut  shells 
defend  the  kernels  from  the  enemies  that  may 
destroy  them.  Squirrels  must  gnaw,  and  small 
boys  must  hammer  to  get  through  that  solid, 
wooden  wall.  The  planter  always  cracks  the 
shell,  to  help  the  seed  to  get  out  when  it  sprouts 
in  spring. 

The  second  American  walnut,  also  an  eastern 
species,  is  the  White  Walnut,  commonly  called, 
from  its  oily  kernel,  the  Butternut.  The  fruit  is  a 
long,  pointed  nut,  dark-colored,  and  deeply 
sculptured.  The  fuzzy,  clammy,  green  husk 
leaks  an  aromatic  juice  that  stains  the  hands  of  the 
nut-gatherer  scandalously,  if  he  doesn't  take  care. 
This  fluid  made  the  dye  the  housewife  used  in  old 
times  to  color  homespun  woolens  to  the  butternut 
browns,  common  in  men's  suits.  The  green  nuts 
were  rubbed  free  from  their  furry  coverings,  and 
pickled.  They  make  a  fine  sauce  with  meats.  The 
nuts  are  rich,  but  they  soon  become  rancid. 
This  takes  them  out  of  the  list  of  commercial 
nuts,  but  they  will  always  be  a  treat  for  country 
boys  and  girls  to  eat  with  roasted  apples  and  cider, 
around  the  open  fire. 


IO8  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL   PLANTS 

ENGLISH   WALNUTS 

Names  have  interesting  histories.  The  English 
Walnut  came  to  the  Boston  and  New  York  markets 
from  English  shipping  houses,  before  commerce 
had  established  more  direct  lines  of  steamships 
between  the  United  States  and  the  southern 
ports  of  Europe,  and  before  California  began  to 
supply  the  country  with  home-grown  nuts  of  the 
same  kinds.  English  walnuts,  indeed!  Not  a 
nut  ever  ripens  on  the  fine  walnut  trees  that  are 
planted  on  the  "snug  little  island,"  because  the 
season  is  not  long  enough  nor  warm  enough  to 
complete  the  job  the  tree  undertakes.  Accept- 
ing the  fact,  the  English  growers  harvest  the  wal- 
nuts when  the  shells  are  soft  enough  to  thrust  a 
knitting  needle  through  with  ease.  Then  the 
housewives  pickle  the  fruit,  husks  and  all,  and 
make  catsup  of  them.  Both  are  fine  as  relishes 
with  cold  meats. 

"Persian  walnut"  is  the  most  accurate  name  for 
the  tree  we  are  discussing,  for  its  native  home  is  on 
the  hillsides  of  Persia  and  Asia  Minor.  The  tree 
in  the  woods  bore  nuts  that  savage  men  har- 
vested in  the  early  times,  before  history  was  writ- 
ten at  all.  This  tree  was  among  the  first  to  be 
cultivated.  The  nuts  were  gathered  and  planted 


PLANTS   WHOSE    SEEDS   WE   EAT  IO9 

in  countries  to  the  west.  Classical  literature  tells 
of  Juglans,  "the  acorn  of  Jove,"  that  kings  sent 
as  presents  to  other  kings  in  countries  where  this 
rich  delicacy  was  not  grown.  So  the  nut,  Juglans 
regia,  "fit  for  kings,"  made  its  way  into  France, 
where  most  of  the  horticultural  work  of  im- 
provement was  accomplished.  Large  nuts,  with 
rich  flavor  and  thin  shells,  were  grown  centuries 
ago. 

The  herballist  and  botanist,  Parkinson,  wrote 
in  1640  about  a  kind  of  "French  wallnuts,  which 
are  the  greatest  of  any,  within  whose  shell  are 
often  put  a  paire  of  fine  gloves,  neatly  foulded  up 
together."  He  astonished  his  English  readers 
further  by  describing  another  variety  "whose 
shell  is  so  tender  that  it  may  easily  be  broken  be- 
tween one's  fingers,  and  the  nut  itself  is  very 
sweete."  No  wonder  the  English  gardeners  were 
keen  to  grow  these  "wallnuts,"  and  grieve  to  this 
day  that  they  cannot  ripen  the  nuts. 

Southern  California  raises  walnuts  equal  to 
those  of  the  south  of  Europe.  The  climate,  near 
the  coast,  is  mild  and  equable,  and  the  air  moist. 
Irrigation,  with  good  drainage,  and  garden  till- 
age, complete  the  list  of  the  tree's  requirements, 
and  it  flourishes  like  the  biblical  green  bay  tree. 
Twenty  years  of  growth  have  produced  trees 


IIO  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

sixty  feet  in  height  and  spread,  that  yield  six  to 
eight  hundred  pounds  of  nuts  per  tree. 

Compute  the  market  value  of  that  crop  at 
the  retail  price  your  grocer  charges.  Charge  half 
to  cost  of  raising  the  crop  and  getting  it  to  the 
wholesaler.  Then  you  can  understand  why  wal- 
nut growing  is  an  industry  that  is  spreading 
rapidly  into  new  territory. 

I  think  it  must  add  to  a  walnut  farmer's  satis- 
faction to  look  back  along  the  trail  that  brought 
this  tree  from  the  wild  woods  of  Persia  to  the 
garden-orchards  of  his  San  Fernando  Valley, 
behind  Los  Angeles,  and  to  know  that  it  is  more 
than  ever  before  a  tree  that  bears  nuts  "fit  for 
kings'  tables."  No  longer  is  it  what  the  name 
walnut  means,  "a  nut  from  a  far  country,"  but  a 
home-grown  product  of  American  orchards,  and 
cheap  enough  so  that  the  people  can  use  it  as  an 
everyday  food,  more  wholesome  and  better  in  all 
ways  than  meat. 

The  wood  of  the  English  walnut  is  beautiful 
and  valuable,  the  best  in  the  world  for  gunstocks. 
Once  there  was  a  craze  for  walnut  furniture  in 
Europe  that  lasted  until  mahogany,  from  Central 
American  forests,  set  fashion  chasing  after  the 
newest  thing.  The  wars  between  European 
nations  exhausted  the  marketable  walnut  lumber, 


PLANTS   WHOSE    SEEDS   WE    EAT  III 

and  the  threatened  famine  in  material  for  gun- 
stocks  led  to  the  passing  of  a  law  in  several  coun- 
tries, during  the  seventeenth  century,  that  before  a 
certificate  of  marriage  could  be  obtained,  the  young 
man  applying  'must  show  a  certificate  setting 
forth  that  he  had  planted  the  required  number 
of  walnut  trees.  These  plantations,  made  no 
doubt  under  protest,  in  many  cases,  brought 
wealth  to  their  owners,  in  nuts  and  then  lumber, 
in  the  years  that  followed.  It  is  a  pity  that  to- 
day Italy,  whose  walnut  lumber  ranked  highest 
in  quality,  should  not  cover  her  bare  hillsides  with 
the  same  trees,  and  so  restore  the  waste  land  to 
productiveness  and  beauty. 

HICKORIES 

Two  species  of  the  hickory  genus  produce  nuts 
of  fine  quality  in  the  woods,  and  are  beginning  to 
be  improved  by  cultivation  and  seed  selection. 
They  are  the  shagbark,  or  shellbark,  of  the  north- 
ern states,  and  the  pecan  of  the  South.  Both  are 
handsome  shade  trees  and  produce  exceptionally 
good  lumber. 

The  Indians  used  the  nuts  of  these  trees  as 
food,  collecting  stores  of  them  for  winter  each 
autumn,  despite  the  protests  of  the  squirrels. 


112  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

The  early  Virginians,  imitating  the  patient  squaws, 
pounded  the  nuts,  shells,  and  kernels  together,  in  a 
mortar,  then  strained  out,  after  boiling  in  plenty 
of  water,  the  rich  "hickory  milk,"  to  which  they 
added  cornmeal,  and  then  baked,  on  hot  stones 
or  in  ovens,  cakes  fit  for  a  king.  Oil  pressed  from 
the  kernels  they  found  the  equal  of  olive  oil,  a 
luxury  seldom  seen  in  the  New  World  then. 

The  pecan  is  a  long,  pointed  nut,  with  a  much- 
crumpled  kernel  in  an  astringent,  corky,  red 
wrapping,  under  a  thin,  smooth  shell.  Improve- 
ment by  selection  is  reducing  the  thickness  of 
both  coverings,  increasing  the  size  and  plumpness 
of  the  kernel,  and  the  productiveness  of  the  tree. 
Though  many  plantations  of  pecans  have  been 
made,  and  the  crop  is  certainly  a  paying  one,  the 
great  bulk  of  the  pecans  are  still  gathered  in  the 
woods.  The  meats  sell  at  sixty  to  seventy-five 
cents  per  pound. 

CHESTNUTS 

Famous  old  chestnut  trees,  supposed  to  be  near 
two  thousand  years  old,  and  most  picturesque  in 
their  decrepitude,  are  venerated  in  different  sec- 
tions of  southern  Europe.  They  divide  honors 
with  the  ruins  of  temples  built  with  hands.  Far 
more  attractive,  to  my  mind,  are  the  sturdy  trees 


PLANTS    WHOSE    SEEDS    WE    EAT 

of  middle  age,  burdened  in  October  with  the  fruit, 
that  falls  out  of  the  prickly,  opening  burs,  much 
as  our  own  chestnuts  do  in  late  fall.  They  are 
much  bigger  fruit  than  ours,  but  not  so  sweet  and 
rich  in  flavor.  '  These  chestnuts  are  starchy,  and 
nutritious,  furnishing  a  staple  food  comparable 
to  the  potato,  though  sometimes  made  into  sweets. 

The  American  nut  is  not  usually  cooked,  but 
eaten  raw  when  mature,  which  is  about  Christmas 
time.  The  shells  are  thin  and  tough,  but  the 
meats  are  rich  in  flavor  and  very  sweet.  Roasting 
cracks  the  shell  and  makes  the  nuts  mealy. 

The  timber  of  chestnut  trees  is  especially  valu- 
able for  railroad  ties,  as  the  wood  does  not  readily 
decay  in  contact  with  the  soil.  So  the  lumber 
business  was  vitally  concerned  when,  a  few  years 
ago,  the  chestnut  trees  in  the  neighborhood  of  New 
York  City  mysteriously  died.  The  swollen  twigs 
of  the  smitten  trees  were  studded  with  yellow 
pellets,  or  crumbs  —  the  fruiting  bodies  of  the 
fungous  disease  that  had  developed  unseen  under 
the  bark.  Out  of  these  pellets  the  "blight"  dis- 
charged the  spores  that  were  carried  away,  by 
wind,  and  possibly  by  birds,  to  spread  the  infec- 
tion to  healthy  trees.  The  baffling  thing  is  the 
fact  that  no  spray  of  Bordeaux  mixture,  or  other 
fungicide,  can  be  applied  to  this  deadly  blight,  for 


114  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL   PLANTS 

it  works  in  the  dark  —  in  the  tree's  vital  part, 
the  cambium,  that  lies  hidden  by  the  outer  bark. 

Much  money  has  been  spent  in  the  effort  to 
conquer  this  disease  and  to  check  its  onward  prog- 
ress. The  problem  is  understood,  but  its  solution 
has  not  yet  been  reached,  and  the  outlook  for  the 
future  of  chestnut  forests  is  most  discouraging. 

Chestnut  trees  introduced  from  Japan  promise 
us  a  home-grown  nut  equal  to  the  best  European 
varieties.  These  oriental  chestnuts  are  large  and 
fine  in  flavor  when  cooked.  The  trees  are  hand- 
some, and  they  bear  at  a  very  early  age.  These 
traits  in  a  hardy  species  assure  its  popularity  over 
a  large  territory. 

Chinquapins  are  small  chestnuts,  the  fruit  of  a 
dwarf  species,  that  grows  on  barren,  broken 
ground  from  the  Middle  States  south  and  west. 
The  husk  contains  a  single  nut,  which  is  sweet  and 
rich,  but  rarely  seen  in  markets,  because  the 
gathering  is  slow  and  difficult  work.  But  pigs 
enjoy  themselves  in  the  woods  when  the  chin- 
quapins are  opening  their  spiny  little  burs. 

BEECHES 

The  small,  triangular  nut  that  is  borne  in  pairs 
in  the  prickly,  four-parted  husk  of  the  beech  tree 


PLANTS   WHOSE    SEEDS   WE    EAT 

has  small  claim  to  the  attention  of  the  dealer  in 
commercial  nuts.  But  you  and  I  know  that  it 
is  sweet  and  rich,  once  you  get  it  out  of  its  shell. 
Its  chief  limitation  is  its  diminutive  size.  In  a 
good  year,  the*  crop  will  furnish  the  best  of  past- 
urage for  fattening  pigs.  In  the  old  days,  the 
settlers  counted  on  turning  their  swine  into  the 
woods  to  get  into  condition  for  the  finest  bacon 
_and  h-ams.  This  fact  gives  significance  to  a  pop- 
ular trademark. 

Beechnuts  in  Europe  have,  from  ancient  times, 
been  used  as  an  article  of  human  food.  Beech- 
nut oil,  refined,  is  as  sweet  as  olive  oil.  It  is 
used  as  a  cooking  oil,  and  in  crude  form  for  illumi- 
nation. 

The  botanical  name  of  the  tree,  Fagus,  comes 
from  a  Greek  word  that  means,  "good  to  eat." 
The  foliage  of  beech  trees,  silky  and  beautiful 
as  it  turns  to  yellow  in  the  fall,  serves  a  number  of 
useful  purposes.  In  Switzerland  the  stable  lofts 
are  stuffed  with  the  leaves  of  beech  and  linden, 
which  cattle  eat  as  winter  fodder.  Mattresses 
are  stuffed  with  the  fragrant  leaves  which  are 
credited  with  sleep-inducing  powers. 

The  wood  of  beech  is  one  of  the  important 
hardwoods  of  Europe.  It  has  the  distinction  of 
being  used  for  the  leaves  of  the  first  books  made. 


Il6  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL    PLANTS 

The  word  book  goes  back  to  the  same  root  as 
beech.  The  smoothest  bark  in  the  woods  was 
naturally  chosen  when  tribal  chiefs  sent  the  first 
messages,  written  in  crude  hieroglyphics,  to  each 
other.  Unfortunately  the  tendency  to  carve  on 
beech  bark  persists.  It  is  impossible  to  find  a 
well-grown  tree  in  park  or  near  a  high  road  that 
has  not  been  scarred  with  jack-knife  monograms, 
and  meaningless  symbols. 

OTHER   NUTS    OF    COMMERCE 

Hazelnuts  are  small  and  hard-shelled  but 
delicious  nuts,  that  grow  on  small  bushes  in  the 
American  woods,  and  come  to  market  locally  and 
in  very  small  quantities.  The  clearing  away  of 
forests  has  exterminated  them  in  many  regions, 
and  thereby  we  lose  a  charming  shrub. 

The  filbert^or:  cob  nut,  is  the  large  hazelnut  of 
Europe.  It  is  imported  in  considerable  quantities 
but  is  not  grown  here  for  market. 

Brazil  nuts  are  grown  on  large  trees  in  the  for- 
ests of  South  America.  They  are  rich  in  oil  which 
is  extracted  for  the  use  of  watchmakers  and 
artists.  The  port  of  Para  ships  most  of  the  nuts 
to  other  countries,  where  they  are  eaten  with 
relish  by  those  who  do  not  object  to  the  oily,  white 
meats.  Para-nuts  and  "nigger- toes"  are  names 


PLANTS   WHOSE    SEEDS   WE    EAT  llj 

commonly  in  use.  Several  triangular  nuts  grow 
in  a  solid  woody  case  as  big  as  a  man's  head. 

Pistachio-nuts  are  the  seeds  of  a  sumach  tree, 
native  to  Asia  Minor.  The  pale  green  kernels 
are  enclosed  in  a  thin,  two-parted  shell,  which  is 
easily  opened  when  the  nuts  are  dried.  They  are 
oily  and  have  an  agreeable  flavor.  Quantities 
of  the  nuts  are  consumed  by  the  people  of  India. 
Americans  use  them  in  confectionery  and  for 
flavoring  and  coloring  ice  creams  and  other  fancy 
desserts.  They  are  also  used  as  salted  nuts. 

A  related  sumach  yields  the  lacquer  of  Japanese 
boxes,  an  unexcelled  varnish,  shiny  and  black,  made 
from  the  sap  of  the  trees.  The  leaves  of  another 
yield  tanning  material,  used  in  making  the  finest 
of  leathers.  Wax  is  another  useful  product  of  the 
sap  of  certain  sumach  species. 

Cashew-nuts  are  queer,  kidney-shaped,  or  U- 
shaped  nuts,  in  hard  shells,  each  borne  as  a  small 
appendage  below  the  fleshy-colored  stalk,  that 
might  be  mistaken  for  the  fruit.  The  trees  which 
are  large,  and  look  like  walnuts,  are  chiefly  West 
Indian  and  tropical  American  species.  The  nuts 
are  exported  to  other  tropical  countries,  and  are 
coming  to  be  used  now  in  the  United  States,  where 
they  are  roasted  in  oil  and  salted  like  almonds. 

Cocoanuts  are  described  under  Palms. 


Plants  Whose  Leaves  and  Stems  We  Eat 


CHAPTER  V 
LETTUCE 

THE  wild  prickly  lettuce  grows  as  a  tall,  ragged- 
looking  weed  along  our  roadsides,  and  springs  up 
in  fields  whenever  they  lie  fallow,  or  are  not  care- 
fully cultivated.  We  call  it  the  "compass  plant," 
because  its  narrow,  opposite  leaves  hold  true  to 
the  points  of  the  compass.  The  blades  avoid  the 
full  force  of  the  sun  by  turning  edgewise  to  its 
rays.  Break  off  a  spray  of  the  narrow-necked, 
daisy-like  flowers,  and  the  family  name,  Com- 
posite, is  plain.  The  Latin  name  of  the  lettuce, 
Lactuca,  refers  to  the  milky  juice.  It  has  medic- 
inal properties  that  soothe  and  sometimes  induce 
sleep.  A  lettuce  salad  and  a  combination  of 
lettuce  and  celery  are  good  for  tired  nerves. 

The  wild  lettuce  looks  over  the  garden  fence, 
or  the  frame  of  the  hotbed,  at  rows  of  green  heads 
of  cabbage  lettuce,  solid  yet  tender,  the  crumpled 
outer  leaves  covering  the  blanched  heart  —  a 
sight  the  gardeners  gloats  over  —  the  most  popular 
salad  plant  in  the  world! 

121 


122  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

Thousands  of  years  separate  the  wild  parent 
plant  from  its  domesticated  offspring.  But  the 
relationship  is  established  without  a  doubt.  Cen- 
turies before  Christ  the  Persian  kings  were  served 
with  salads  made  of  the  leaves  of  wild  lettuces. 
The  parent  species  grows  in  Europe  and  has  come 
as  an  immigrant  to  America,  but  the  original  home 
was  Central  Asia.  Let  the  garden  lettuce  stand  a 
few  days  after  it  reaches  prime  condition  for  the 
table  and  it  bolts  to  seed.  The  flowers  and  dande- 
lion-like head  of  seeds  are  like  those  of  the  wild 
species.  The  leaves  have  been  broadened  and  the 
stem  shortened  through  the  centuries  of  cultivation. 

Most  of  us  remember  the  lettuce  bed  in  the 
garden,  crowded  with  plants  from  seeds  sown 
broadcast.  We  picked  the  leaves,  one  by  one. 
The  individual  plants  were  not  considered.  The 
later  method  is  to  transplant  the  seedlings,  and 
let  each  one  form  a  head. 

Three  lines  of  development  have  been  followed 
in  the  improvement  of  the  wild  lettuce,  with  the 
understanding  that  succulence  of  the  leaves,  and 
delicacy  of  flavor  are  striven  for  first  of  all.  The 
first  aims  at  a  rosette  of  crowded,  flaring  leaves; 
the  second,  at  a  close,  self-blanching  head;  the 
third  at  a  long,  moderately  close  head  of  fleshy 
leaves,  with  particularly  tender  midribs. 


LEAVES  AND  STEMS  WE  EAT        123 

As  to  cultivation,  three  classes  of  lettuces  have 
been  developed :  (i)  Quick-growing  spring  varie- 
ties; (2)  large,  heat-resisting  summer  varieties; 
(3)  hardy  winter  varieties. 

The  Boston  'head  lettuce,  with  its  crumpled, 
plain-marginned  leaves,  tender  and  rich  in  flavor, 
from  the  green  outside  to  the  white  centre,  is  the 
favorite  in  this  country.  It  is  grown  the  year 
round  "in  the  open,  in  hotbeds,  in  cold  frames,  for 
home  use  and  for  city  markets. 

The  English  people,  at  home  and  in  Canada, 
are  devoted  to  the  Cos  lettuces,  with  the  long 
head  of  spoon-shaped  leaves,  tender  and  rich  in 
flavor,  with  midribs  thick  and  white,  almost  like 
those  of  Swiss  chard.  These  leaves  are  eaten  like 
celery,  dipped  in  salt,  as  well  as  in  salads.  Ameri- 
cans are  learning  to  grow  these  excellent  varieties. 

The  cool,  damp  climate  of  England  is  admir- 
ably adapted  to  lettuce  culture.  Many  of  the 
hundred  cultivated  varieties  have  originated  in 
English  experimental  grounds.  Loose,  rich  soil 
and  good  culture  keep  the  plants  growing  rapidly, 
which  is  the  main  aim  in  the  production  of  any 
leaf  crop. 

Since  growth  takes  place  in  daylight,  and  the 
plants  rest  by  night,  experiments  to  test  the 
effects  of  artificial  light  have  been  made.  Lettuce 


124  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL   PLANTS 

is  one  of  the  crops  most  benefited.  Plants  that 
received  the  light  from  electric  arc  lamps  half  the 
night  are  ready  for  market  a  week  or  two  weeks 
sooner  than  the  normal  crop.  Gardeners  that 
make  a  specialty  of  forcing  lettuce  find  that  it 
pays  to  use  the  light  in  their  houses;  the  quicker 
the  heads  mature,  the  higher  their  quality. 

ENDIVE 

When  lettuces,  languishing  under  the  summer 
heat,  bolt  to  seed  in  the  garden  rows,  instead  of 
making  the  fine  heads  we  expect,  we  must  be  re- 
signed, and  turn  our  attention  to  the  late-sown 
endive  for  our  autumn  salads.  So  many  people 
do  not  know  the  plant,  whose  thick  rosette  of 
narrow,  frizzled  leaves  shade  so  beautifully  from 
dark  green  to  the  creamy-white  centre.  Tied 
loosely  at  the  top,  for  a  week  or  ten  days  after  it 
reaches  full  growth,  the  plant  blanches.  Blanch- 
ing modifies  the  tang  of  dandelion  in  the  leaves; 
as  they  whiten  and  acquire  an  extremely  delicate 
flavor.  No  salad  is  prettier  in  the  bowl  than 
endive;  and  none  is  more  wholesome  as  a  food 
and  tonic  combined.. 

It  was  the  foreigners  that  put  endive  on  the 
benches  of  American  greengrocer  shops,  and  thus 


LEAVES    AND    STEMS    WE    EAT  1 25 

taught  us  to  eat  what  we  cannot  resist  buying 
because  it  is  so  pretty.  Europeans  use  it  as  a  pot 
herb,  and  the  gardeners  have  so  far  improved  the 
varieties  that  it  is  in  market  the  year  round. 
There  are  self-blanching  kinds,  that  head  like 
cabbages  when  partly  grown.  A  broad-leaved  kind 
is  called  Escarolle. 

When  the  blossoms  appear,  they  are  blue  and 
closely  resemble  the  ray-flowered  chicory,  a  near 
relative,  in  the  Composite  Family. 

DANDELION 

The  teeth  of  a  lion  form  a  jagged  line,  just  like 
the  toothed  margin  of  the  leaf  of  this  familiar 
dooryard  plant,  the  dandelion.  "Dent-de-lion" 
is  the  French  name.  Can  you  read  the  meaning 
into  it? 

Dandelions  grow  wild  and  rampant  over  the 
Temperate  Zones  of  the  northern  and  southern 
hemispheres,  and  are  always  invading  new  terri- 
tory. The  acrid  juice  has  a  considerable  reputa- 
tion in  home  remedies  concocted  by  old  wives, 
versed  in  herbs  and  simples.  Dried  roots  of  dan- 
delion are  among  the  druggist's  stock,  too.  The 
earliest  shoots  have  a  tonic  effect  on  the  sluggish 
system  of  one  who  has  kept  indoors  all  winter. 


126       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

Boiled  as  greens,  these  young  dandelion  rosettes 
are  just  what  the  hungry  man  craves  and  enjoys 
in  April. 

The  constant  demand  for  wild  dandelion  greens 
in  the  Paris  markets  led  the  gardeners  to  bring  in 
the  wild  plants,  select  the  best  for  seed,  and  thus 
to  improve  the  species,  and  make  of  it  a  garden  pot 
herb.  The  wild  plant  is  stringy,  and  bitter  in 
flavor  compared  with  the  crisp,  half-blanched, 
mossy-fringed  leaves  of  cultivated  varieties.  The 
improvement  is  accounted  for  by  good  culture  in 
fertile  soil.  Blanched  dandelion  salad  in  early 
spring  is  like  the  endive  that  comes  in  fall. 

GLOBE    ARTICHOKE 

The  French  people  are  particularly  fond  of  a 
vegetable  which  is  the  flower  head  of  a  robust  plant 
belonging  to  the  same  family  as  the  daisy  and  sun- 
flower. All  such  plants  bear  numerous  small 
flowers,  on  a  flat,  circular  disk,  surrounded  and 
protected  by  green  scales,  called  bracts,  that  over- 
lap, in  rows,  concealing  the  flowers  until  opening 
time. 

The  edible  parts  of  the  globe  artichoke  are  the 
tender  bases  of  the  bracts,  and  the  succulent  disk 
itself,  after  the  flowers  are  removed.  This  is 


LEAVES   AND    STEMS   WE    EAT  127 

done  after  the  heads  are  boiled  tender.  The 
bracts  are  easily  removed  as  eaten.  We  dip  the 
tender  white  end  into  melted  butter,  and  finally 
eating  the  white  "bottom"  with  the  same  season- 
ing. 

Dressed  with  oil  and  vinegar,  the  tender  por- 
tions of  boiled  artichokes  make  a  delicious  salad. 
Many  more  ways  of  cooking  and  serving  this 
high-quality  vegetable  will  be  hunted  up  by  all 
who  like  it. 

The  artichokes  grown  so  extensively  for  market 
and  for  home  use  in  France  can  be  grown  here 
but  we  have  not  got  at  it  yet.  The  plant  is  very 
lusty,  even  as  it  grows  wild  in  Barbary  and 
southern  Europe.  In  the  garden  it  grows  easily 
to  a  height  of  three  or  four  feet,  and  its  hand- 
some cut  leaves  are  a  yard  or  more  in  length.  It 
deserves  to  be  raised,  if  only  as  an  ornamental 
plant. 

The  numerous  varieties  of  artichoke  grown  in 
the  gardens  of  rich  and  poor  in  France  are  all  reg- 
ularly propagated  by  suckers  rather  than  by  seeds. 
These  new  shoots  start  from  the  main  stem 
just  underground.  They  are  cut  off,  each  with  a 
bit  of  the  old  stem  as  a  "heel."  One  or  more 
suckers  are  left  to  make  a  new  top  on  the  old 
plant,  which  outlives  its  usefulness  in  three  years. 


128  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

Though  it  would  go  on  bearing,  the  size  and 
quality  of  the  heads  decline.  Each  sucker  set 
out  soon  grows  into  a  vigorous  new  plant  with 
two  or  three  years  of  abundant  productivity  before 
it,  if  the  gardener  does  his  duty. 

SPINACH 

For  greens  there  is  no  plant  that  compares  in 
popularity  and  merit  with  spinach.  It  is  a  mem- 
ber of  the  Goosefoot  Family,  that  produces  a 
great  many  weeds  in  America,  but  no  plants  of 
any  value.  The  gardens  of  Europe  have  produced 
many  early,  late,  and  midsummer  varieties.  In 
warm  regions  spinach  grows  all  the  year  round. 
California  gardeners  need  never  be  without  it. 
Even  in  New  York  state,  the  plants  will  live  over, 
if  protected  by  a  mulch,  and  in  many  places 
without.  Thus,  a  crop  sown  in  October  gets  a 
good  start  before  winter,  and  is  up  and  ready  for 
cutting  early  in  spring. 

New  Zealand  spinach  belongs  to  a  different 
family,  botanically,  but  from  the  gardeners' 
standpoint  it  is  close  to  the  other  species.  Its 
fleshy  leaves  are  able  to  withstand  the  hottest 
weather,  and  furnish  the  table  with  a  most 
acceptable  pot  herb  when  others  fail  utterly. 


A  thrifty  peanut  field  in  North   Carolina 


A  single  peanut  plant  and  its  nuts  shaken  free  from  dirt 


LEAVES  AND  STEMS  WE  EAT        129 

Common  spinach  is  a  cool  weather  crop,  and  needs 
moist  air  and  soil.  The  summer  plantings  in  hot 
climates  soon  run  to  seed,  instead  of  producing  the 
broad,  crumpled  leaves  normal  in  all  cultivated 
varieties. 

ASPARAGUS 

Asparagus  is  a  member  of  the  Lily  Family,  as 
the  tiny,  bell-shaped  flowers,  and  the  fleshy  ber- 
ries declare,  but  the  narrow  leaves,  and  the  needle- 
branched  plant,  when  it  reaches  four  feet  in 
height,  suggest  any  other  family  than  the  lily. 
I  think  the  species,  which  stands  alone,  must  have 
originated  by  the  sea  (or  risen  like  Venus  from 
the  waves).  You  may  pour  brine  on  your  aspara- 
gus bed,  or  scatter  dry  salt  on  the  soil  until  the 
weeds  lie  down  and  die.  The  asparagus  shoots 
come  up  refreshed  and  invigorated  by  the  salt 
bath  furnished  their  roots. 

The  edible  parts  of  this  vegetable  are  the  fleshy 
shoots  rising  from  vigorous  crowns,  that  have 
been  storing  for  some  years  the  reserve  food  to 
produce  the  crop.  The  French  gardeners  have 
been  very  successful  in  producing  choice  vari- 
etiesj"  !  They  like  best  those  whose  stalks  are  thick, 
short,  and  rosy  at  the  tip.  In  Holland  and  Bel- 
gium, a  perfectly  blanched  stalk  is  the  ideal.  In 


I3O  THE    BOOK    OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

American  gardens,  green  stalks,  if  they  are  tender, 
are  counted  better  in  flavor  than  the  blanched 
ones. 

The  shoots  are  continuously  cut  from  the  un- 
covering of  the  bed  in  April  until  new  peas  appear 
in  the  markets,  and  are  ready  in  the  gardens. 
Then  the  asparagus  has  a  chance  to  grow  unmo- 
lested. The  bed  is  soon  covered  with  a  dense 
bramble  of  plants  that  bear  their  seeds,  and  thus 
seed  the  ground  under  them.  The  full  develop- 
ment of  the  leafy  tops  stores  the  roots  and  crowns 
with  reserve  food,  which  is  drawn  upon  to  make 
the  cutting  good  in  the  asparagus  season  that  fol- 
lows the  rest  period  of  winter. 

California  produces  a  tremendous  asparagus 
crop,  that  goes  fresh  to  local  markets,  or  is  canned 
for  shipment  to  eastern  cities. 

SWISS   CHARD 

A  race  of  beets  is  known  to  gardeners  under  the 
name  Swiss  chard.  Like  the  ornamental  beet,  its 
root  is  small  and  tough,  and  the  leaves  are  the 
part  for  which  the  plants  are  grown.  Thick, 
tender  leaf  stalks  branch  out  into  the  web  of  the 
leaf,  and  this  also  is  tender  and  edible  as  the  leaf 
of  spinach.  Some  people  prefer  to  cook  stalks 


LEAVES   AND    STEMS    WE    EAT 

and  leaves  together  as  a  pot  herb  when  less  than 
fully  grown.  Some  strip  the  stalks,  boil  them  in 
convenient  lengths,  and  serve  like  asparagus. 
Sometimes  the  leaf  blades  are  boiled  as  a  separate 
dish,  or  served  cold  in  a  salad.  The  stalks  are 
white  in  most  species. 

If  the  roots  are  undisturbed,  and  only  the  outer 
leaves  taken  off,  chard  plants  will  continue  indefi- 
nitely to  form  new  leaves.  When  other  vege- 
tables take  the  place  of  chard,  or  the  family  tires 
of  pot  herbs,  the  wisest  course  is  to  keep  the  plants 
and  harvest  the  leaves  for  the  chickens.  Little 
and  big,  they  all  eat  the  succulent  food  eagerly, 
and  thrive  on  it  as  a  green  ration  with  their  dry 
grain  foods. 

CRESSES 

The  pungent  watery  juice  of  the  cress  group, 
and  their  cross-bearing  flowers  at  time  of  bloom, 
prove  that  the  Mustard  Family  embraces  them 
all.  There  is  a  strong  family  likeness,  especially 
when  one  nibbles  first  one  and  then  another  of 
these  related  plants. 

The  leaves  of  cresses  are  the  principal  edible 
parts,  though  tender  stems  are  good,  too.  They 
are  eaten  as  a  salad  or  minced  in  soup,  or  merely 
garnish  meats  on  the  platters.  "Small  salads" 


132  THE    BOOK    OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

are  made  of  the  first  or  seed  leaves  of  newly  sown 
cress,  or  white  mustard.  Frequent  sowings  keep 
up  the  supply  throughout  the  season. 

Water  cress  is  a  most  wholesome  and  delicate 
salad  plant.  It  is  best  raised  in  a  clear,  small, 
running  brook.  Next  best  is  the  margin  of  a  pond. 
Last,  it  grows  in  ordinary  garden  soil,  if  it  be  kept 
moist  through  good  culture,  and  freely  treated  to 
water. 

Along  roadsides  one  often  sees  brooks  choked 
with  a  luxuriant  growth  of  cress.  The  tempta- 
tion to  gather  a  lot  of  it  is  almost  irresistible. 
The  only  question  is :  "  Is  the  water  polluted  with 
sewage?"  Typhoid  fever  is  certainly  carried  by 
water  cress  from  impure  streams.  So  we  usually 
drive  on,  if  we  are  well-informed  as  to  the  danger. 

To  get  cresses  started  in  our  own  brook  we 
must  sow  the  seed  in  a  box,  and  as  the  little  plants 
come  on,  transplant  them  into  the  sand  where  the 
flow  is  scarcely  perceptible,  and  the  water  barely 
covers  the  sand.  When  they  are  established 
thin  them  by  taking  up  and  throwing  into  deeper 
water,  the  ones  the  thinning  removes.  They  will 
catch  root  and  multiply. 

Another  way  is  to  buy  a  bunch  of  water  cress, 
take  out  the  fresh,  new  shoots  and  plant  them,  as 
we  would  young  ones  from  the  seedbox.  It  is 


LEAVES    AND    STEMS   WE    EAT  133 

but  a  short  time  until  they  take  to  root  and  become 
established.  Then  cutting  merely  makes  more 
luxurious  growth,  till  winter  stops  it.  Indeed, 
the  way  to  keep  cress  from  freezing  is  to  flood  the 
bed,  so  that  ic'e  roofs  it.  Next  spring  the  supply 
will  be  as  abundant  as  ever. 

When  old  plants  begin  to  fail  they  should  be 
pulled  out  and  a  new  bed  started.  There  is 
nothing  quite  so  good  with  roast  fowls  as  plenty 
of  fresh,  tender  cress. 

Garden  cress  has  long  been  in  cultivation  from 
Portugal  to  India.  In  every  country  it  has  a 
distinct  common  name.  It  grows  as  easily  as 
weeds  in  the  gardens  of  rich  and  poor  alike.  Any 
soil,  any  season,  suits  it.  Abuse  does  not  keep  it 
from  abundant  growth.  And  it  is  as  wholesome 
a  salad,  when  picked  in  the  tender  stage,  as  one 
can  find. 

CELERY 

In  its  wild  state,  celery  is  a  rather  fleshy- 
rooted  weed,  on  waste  land  in  parts  of  Europe, 
with  a  top  of  cut  leaves,  and  flower  clusters  of  the 
umbrella  type.  It  belongs  in  the  same  family 
with  parsley,  carrots,  parsnips,  and  fennel.  No 
one  would  think  of  tasting  either  root  or  leaf 


134  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

stalk,  for  the  sap  is  poisonous  and  bitter.  But  out 
of  that  unpromising  weed  has  come  by  cultiva- 
tion a  vegetable  that  is  as  wholesome  as  it  is 
delicate  in  flavor  and  handsome  in  appearance. 
It  is  universally  popular  with  all  classes  of 
people. 

Improvement  in  celery  culture  has  produced 
self-blanching  varieties,  and  developed  from  a 
winter  vegetable  varieties  for  all  seasons.  The  old 
method  of  growing  celery  in  trenches  has  been 
replaced  by  the  easy  method  of  growing  it  on  the 
garden  level,  and  hilling  up  the  rows,  when  the 
time  comes,  to  blanch  the  stems.  From  a  special 
crop,  that  only  market  gardeners  could  raise 
successfully,  celery  has  become  a  common  crop, 
in  anybody's  and  everybody's  garden,  great  or 
small. 

Nearest  to  the  wild  celery,  that  grows  in  wet 
ground  near  the  sea,  is  the  soup  celery  of  European 
cottage  gardens,  a  many-stemmed,  green  plant 
whose  mild  leaves  lack  the  poisonous  qualities 
of  the  wild  celery,  and  have  the  nutty  flavor  of 
the  blanched  varieties.  The  leaves  are  cut  as 
needed,  and  minced  like  parsley  to  flavor  soups  and 
salads.  New  leaves  come  on,  so  the  plant  is 
productive  for  months. 

In  England  a  red-stemmed  celery  is  very  popu- 


LEAVES   AND    STEMS   WE    EAT  135 

lar.  But  the  ideal  variety  in  America  has  stalks 
solid,  tender,  and  white  to  the  leaves. 

The  richest  moist  loam,  like  pond  muck,  is 
the  best  celery  soil.  From  the  seed  bed  the  little 
plants  are  set  out,  and  given  cultivation  that 
keeps  the  soil  mellow  and  clean,  and  keeps  them 
growing.  Gradually  the  earth  is  banked  higher 
on  each  side  of  the  row,  till  only  a  tuft  of  top 
leaves  stick  out.  Now  the  stalks  have  been 
blanched,  and  the  crop  is  ready  for  market. 
Each  plant  is  trimmed  free  from  its  outer,  rough 
leaves,  the  root  shortened  to  a  V,  and  the  top 
docked. 

Sometimes  celery  is  banked  between  parallel 
boards,  close  to  the  row,  and  filled  with  earth. 
Rarely  a  celery  bed  is  filled  with  earth  about  the 
plants,  and  a  board  wall  placed  around  the  whole 
plot.  Self-blanching  varieties  are  early,  and  re- 
quire little  help  from  the  gardener  to  prepare 
them  for  market,  which  comes  in  summer 
time. 

The  principal  use  of  celery  is  to  be  eaten  raw 
with  salt.  It  is  served  with  the  meat  courses  at 
dinner.  Next  in  importance  comes  its  use  cut 
up  in  salads  usually  with  nuts,  fruits  or  other 
vegetables.  More  rarely  it  is  boiled  as  a  vege- 
table, and  dressed  with  butter  or  a  cream  sauce. 


136  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

It  is  much  used  as  a  seasoning  for  soups  and 
stews.  The  roots  are  good  for  this  purpose,  and 
eaten  raw  are  more  nutty  and  sweet  than  the 
leaves.  So  they  should  never  be  discarded. 
Celery  seeds  are  very  good  in  salads  and  for 
seasoning.  They  are  sold  by  grocers  for  this 
purpose.  They  are  so  light  and  small  that 
it  takes  about  50,000  of  them  to  weigh  an 
ounce. 

Celeriac,  or  turnip-rooted  celery,  is  a  variety 
that  is  useful  as  a  root  vegetable  and  as  seasoning, 
when  sliced  or  grated  into  soups.  The  stems  of 
this  variety  are  tough  and  hollow  and  short. 
Development  has  gone  in  quite  a  different  direc- 
tion from  that  which  produced  the  white,  succu- 
lent stalks  of  the  ordinary  celery  on  our  tables. 
Celeriac  is  not  so  commonly  raised  in  our  gardens 
as  it  deserves.  Those,  who  grow  it  say  that  it  is 
easy  of  culture.  It  adds  to  the  winter  store  in 
the  root  cellar  another  wholesome  vegetable. 

Celery  has  valuable  medicinal  properties,  that 
act  favorably  upon  the  general  system  of  those 
who  eat  it  freely.  Its  value  is  recognized  by 
makers  of  patent  medicines.  But  sensible  people 
will  prefer  to  take  their  celery  as  it  comes  to  the 
table,  from  the  garden,  rather  than  in  liquid  form, 
out  of  a  bottle. 


LEAVES   AND    STEMS    WE    EAT  137 

PARSLEY 

Wherever  we  go,  the  parsley  plant  is  there  to 
welcome  us,  as  we  sit  down,  hungry  as  a  bear, 
to  a  good,  square  meal.  The  soup  and  the  fish 
are  seasoned  with  a  sprinkle  of  minced  pars- 
ley. Its  curly  leaves  garnish  the  steak  or  the 
omelette,  and  the  salad  is  seasoned  and  adorned 
by  the  same  fern-like  leaves.  And  we  do  not 
tire  of  it,  morning,  noon,  and  night.  It  is  known 
to  everybody  and  it  has  real  food  value;  it 
is  not  merely  an  accessory  to  the  essential 
foods. 

It  is  a  pity  that  parsley  is  not  grown  in-  every 
garden  for  we  need  more  green  food  than  most  of 
us  eat,  and  the  commonest  dishes  are  improved 
by  it.  The  reason  may  be  that  people  get  dis- 
couraged waiting  for  the  seeds  to  sprout,  or  forget 
where  they  were  planted.  It  takes  a  month  to 
six  weeks  for  the  little  plants  to  show  themselves 
and  they  are  feeble  until  they  have  attained  some 
size.  If  the  soil  is  kept  loose  and  free  from  weeds, 
a  few  plants  will  soon  furnish  all  the  parsley  the 
cook  can  ask,  and  the  bed  will  be  a  beautiful  green 
pillow  until  frost  comes. 

The  fore-handed  gardener  pots  some  little 
plants,  and  when  winter  comes  has  parsley  to 


138       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

brighten  the  kitchen  windows  and  to  furnish 
leaves  for  cutting  throughout  the  cold  weather. 

Sardinia  is  the  original  home  of  wild  parsley, 
but  to-day  it  grows  in  most  European  countries, 
run  wild  from  gardens,  and  gone  back  to  the  plain 
leaves  that  mark  the  parent  form.  Selection  for 
more  ornamental  leaves  has  developed  the  double- 
curled  varieties  with  leaves,  marvellously  fluted 
and  frayed  and  multiplied  in  their  subdivisions. 

In  sharp  contrast  with  the  wiry-rooted,  bushy- 
topped  varieties,  is  the  turnip-rooted  parsley, 
with  almost  no  leaves  at  all.  The  fleshy  roots 
are  cut  up  and  used  as  a  vegetable,  or  as  soup 
flavoring.  This  plant  is  like  celeriac,  the  flesh- 
rooted  celery,  in  flavor  and  use. 

SEA-KALE 

A  robust  member  of  the  Mustard  Family  grows 
on  the  west  coasts  of  Europe,  right  down  on  the 
dunes,  to  the  line  the  tide  reaches.  In  other 
countries  it  is  considered  a  weed,  but  along  the 
English  Channel  the  people  who  live  near  the 
beach  claim  the  sea-kale  that  grows  in  front  of 
their  ground.  When  the  cold  weather  comes  and 
the  tops  die  down,  the  natives  go  out  with  shovels 
and  heap  sand  and  gravel  a  foot  deep  or  more 


LEAVES   AND    STEMS   WE    EAT  139 

on  the  stumps.  This  keeps  the  kale  from  being 
trampled,  and  when  the  new  shoots  spring  up  in 
March,  it  keeps  them  from  turning  green.  For 
three  weeks  or  more  the  harvest  of  the  sea-kale 
is  sent  to  city  markets,  where  the  long,  fleshy  and 
perfectly  blanched  stalks  supply  a  delicately 
flavored  vegetable,  at  a  season  when  fresh  vege- 
tables are  scarce. 

Copying  the  methods  of  the  shore  people  of 
Hampshire,  gardeners  grow  sea-kale  from  seed 
and  from  root  cuttings,  and  year  after  year  cover 
the  tops  and  cut  the  blanched  leaves  as  they 
reach  proper  size.  The  bitter  of  green  mustard 
leaves  is  dissipated  by  the  bleaching,  and  the 
broad  leaf  stalks,  with  just  a  hint  of  the  blades 
starting,  are  delicious  when  boiled  until  tender 
and  served  as  asparagus  is.  The  flavor  of  hazel- 
nuts  is  very  marked.  Americans  who  taste  this 
vegetable,  properly  cooked,  wish  to  grow  it  at 
home.  The  same  culture  as  that  given  rhubarb 
is  right.  It  is  easy  of  culture  where  rhubarb  will 
grow.  The  plants  live  several  years. 

FENNEL 

A  bitter-sweet  aromatic  odor  and  flavor  are 
strong  in  the  fennel  group  of  the  umbrella- 
flowered  family,  which  includes  parnsips  and  car- 


I4O  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL   PLANTS 

rots,  and  a  dozen  more  garden  vegetables  familiar 
to  us  all.  The  peculiar  odor  is  found  in  the  oil 
that  pervades  all  parts  of  the  plant,  particularly 
the  seeds,  which  are  used  in  making  liqueurs, 
and  in  certain  medicines. 

Cultivated  fennels  are  not  far  removed  from 
their  wild  ancestors,  which  range  as  robust  weeds 
over  southern  Europe  and  parts  of  England,  and 
run  wild  from  gardens  in  places,  in  this  country 
and  abroad.  For  centuries  fennels  have  been 
used  but  they  have  not  been  long  under  cultiva- 
tion. The  wild  plants  furnished  the  supply 
needed. 

The  common  fennel  grows  four  feet  high.  Its 
leaves  are  boiled  and  served  with  different  kinds 
of  fish,  or  minced  raw  to  season  a  sauce  for  salmon 
or  mackerel.  This  species  is  grown  in  gardens. 

The  Florence  fennel  has  at  base  a  bulk-like 
enlargment,  due  to  the  swollen  condition  of  the 
bases  of  the  leaves.  The  tops  of  the  plant  and 
the  root  are  cut  off,  and  the  blanched  leaves  boiled 
till  tender.  They  taste  like  celery.  Often  they 
are  eaten  raw. 

Naples  has  a  famous  fennel  that  grows  no- 
where else.  The  fleshy  flower  stalks,  enclosed 
in  the  broad  leaf  bases,  are  served  raw,  under  the 
name,  "Carosella."  This  delicacy  is  to  be  had 


LEAVES   AND    STEMS   WE    EAT 

all  the  year,  thanks  to  the  pride  and  skill  of  the 
Neapolitan  market  gardeners. 

The  fennel  of  India  is  used  as  medicine  and  for 
seasoning  some  curries.  A  South  African  fennel 
yields  a  thick,  aromatic,  edible  root. 

The  giant  fennel  of  southern  Europe  is  so  rank 
that  nothing  but  buffaloes  of  Apulia  can  eat  it. 
The  pith  is  used  for  tinder  in  Sicily. 

CHERVIL 

The  "fine  herbs"  of  the  French  cooks  is  a 
seasoning  mixture  of  leaves,  chiefly  of  the  plant 
called  chervil.  It  is  a  biennial  of  the  fennel,  car- 
rot and  parsnip  family,  its  flowers  borne  in  the 
umbrella-like  clusters  that  are  the  recognition  sign 
for  this  family. 

Six  weeks  after  the  seeds  are  sown  the  gardener 
may  begin  to  cut  the  aromatic  leaves.  Some 
varieties  are  fringe-leaved,  and  these  are  favorite 
kinds,  used  to  garnish  other  dishes,  and  them- 
selves in  salads.  Turnip-rooted  varieties  are 
grown  as  a  winter  root  vegetable.  The  meaning 
of  " chervil"  is  "joy-leaf." 

DILL 

Dill  pickles  make  us  acquainted  with  a  rather 
rare  flavor  used  by  German  and  Italian  cooks  as 


142  THE    BOOK    OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

seasoning  in  preserves  and  pickles.  It  strikes 
the  American  palate  as  a  blend  of  fennel  and  mint. 
The  seeds  and  sometimes  the  thread-like  leaves 
of  the  tall,  wild  parsnip-like  plant  are  used.  The 
umbrella  cluster  of  flowers  and  seeds  assign  the 
dill  to  the  same  family  as  the  fennel.  In  gardens 
it  grows  easily,  even  if  in  a  colder  climate  than  its 
native  range,  southern  Europe,  if  given  a  warm 
situation,  and  well-drained  soil. 

THE   WILD    CABBAGE    AND    ITS    CHILDREN 

Outside  of  the  pretty  coast  villages  that  look 
out  on  the  English  Channel,  beyond  the  thrifty 
fields  and  market  gardens,  lie  stretches  of  land  so 
rocky  and  uneven  that  it  is  unfit  for  cultivation. 
Tufts  of  weedy  growth  soften  the  bleakness  of 
these  desert  places.  Among  the  native  plants 
that  get  a  living  from  the  scant  soil  is  the  wild 
cabbage,  a  lusty  weed  that  attracted  the  atten- 
tion of  our  savage  forefathers,  thousands  of  years 
ago,  because  its  leaves  were  (and  are  to-day) 
succulent  and  pungent  to  the  taste.  So  the  leaves 
are  in  the  big  mustard  family,  to  which  all  cab- 
bages and  their  kindred  plants  belong. 

All  the  way  from  the  British  Isles  to  Siberia 
the  wild  cabbage  may  be  seen  on  untilled  land, 


LEAVES   AND    STEMS   WE    EAT  143 

usually  as  a  small  plant  on  a  spindling  stem,  its 
blue-green,  fleshy  leaves  spreading  in  a  flat  rosette 
or  closing  at  the  top  to  form  a  loose  ball.  In  soil 
of  greater  depth  the  stem  lifts  its  head  higher,  year 
by  year,  and  strengthens  itself  by  woody  fibres, 
the  side  shoots,  short  and  of  softer  texture,  bearing 
the  leaves.  Stems  three  feet  high  may  be  found  in 
favorable  locations  on  the  Irish  and  English  coasts 
but  on  the  Channel  Islands  a  wild  cabbage  might 
be  mistaken  for  a  tree  of  some  sort.  Darwin  saw 
on  the  island  of  Jersey  a  cabbage  stalk  sixteen  feet 
high!  He  said  that  twelve  feet  in  height  was 
often  attained  by  these  plants,  whose  woody  stalks 
were  used  for  rafters  by  island  builders.  Much 
smaller  plants  have  stems  three  or  four  inches  in 
diameter.  Walking  sticks  are  made  of  still 
smaller  ones. 

A  spike  of  yellow  flowers  crowns  the  top  of  the 
wild  cabbage  plant,  just  like  the  flowers  borne 
by  garden  cabbages  to-day.  Leave  a  solid  head 
in  the  row  after  the  crop  is  cut  for  market,  and 
what  happens?  The  head  bursts  open;  the  stem, 
hidden  by  overlapping  leaves,  keeps  on  growing. 
It  forces  its  way  out  of  prison,  runs  up  a  foot  or 
two,  and  opens  its  yellow  flowers,  that  fade  and 
are  followed  by  pods  full  of  seeds.  Again  we  see 
the  relationship  of  this  vegetable  to  the  mustards. 


144  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

The  pods  and  seeds  look  and  taste  like  those  of 
all  mustard  plants. 

We  can  imagine  how  the  savage  hunter,  return- 
ing to  his  cave  at  evening,  nibbled  a  fleshy  leaf  of 
wild  cabbage  to  quench  his  thirst.  The  pungent, 
watery  juice  was  not  unpleasant  to  the  taste,  and 
the  inner  leaves  of  the  end  rosette  were  tender 
and  almost  white.  When  the  sons  of  those  wild 
hunters  went  with  their  fathers  they  learned  the 
berries  and  other  wild  fruits  good  to  eat,  and  knew 
how  to  pick  out  the  largest,  tenderest  heads  of  the 
wild  cabbage  plants.  The  next  step  may  have 
come  centuries  later  —  a  kind  of  gardening.  I  can 
fancy  the  women  of  the  cave-dwellers  gathering 
little  cabbages  for  food,  and  two  neighbors  claiming 
a  particularly  good  patch  of  the  plants,  and  fight- 
ing over  it.  The  next  step  was  to  throw  up  some 
sort  of  wall  around  it,  to  help  the  selfish  victor  to 
defend  his  claim.  Then  we  can  believe  that,  while 
the  men  were  off  and  the  women  on  watch,  the 
best  plants  were  favored  by  a  little  digging  of  the 
hard  earth  around  their  roots,  and  maybe  watered, 
if  they  suffered  for  a  drink.  Step  by  step,  slow 
as  the  passing  of  the  centuries,  came  the  saving 
of  seed  of  plants  with  the  biggest,  tender  heads, 
and  weeding  and  tending  of  the  young  cabbages 
with  primitive  tools.  The  best  plants  helped  to 


Cauliflower  is  the  most  delicate  vegetable  in  the  plebeian 
cabbage  family 


We  ought  to  know  kohlrabi,  the  turniplike  vegetable, 
related  to  the  cabbages 


LEAVES   AND    STEMS   WE    EAT  145 

be  better,  and  their  seed  planted  for  the  new  crop  : 
this  is  the  way  the  wild  cabbage  became  domesti- 
cated, and  improved,  until  men  demanded  the 
garden  varieties,  and  the  parent  forms  ceases  to 
be  used. 

Every  vegetable,  every  fruit,  that  now  grows 
in  gardens  and  orchards  as  a  cultivated  variety, 
sprang  from  a  wild  species.  In  many  cases,  like 
the  cabbage,  the  parent  plant  is  growing  to-day 
in  its  original  state,  in  some  country.  The  large 
number  of  varieties  is  a  sign  of  the  great  antiquity 
of  the  species. 

Some  wild  cabbage  plants  showed  a  tendency  to 
form  little  heads  at  the  axils  of  their  leaves.  They 
were  encouraged  by  the  grower.  Seeds  of  the  best 
plants  were  sown.  The  new  plants  had  better  ax- 
illary buds.  Gradually  the  terminal  shoot  ceased 
to  head.  The  result  was  the  Brussels  sprouts,  one 
of  the  most  delicate  of  all  cabbage  forms. 

In  some  wild  plants  the  tendency  to  form  fleshy 
subdivisions  of  flower  stems  was  noticed.  Selec- 
tion of  the  best  specimens  for  seed  producers 
finally  resulted  in  a  race  of  cabbages  whose  flowers 
are  borne  on  a  white,  coral-like  mass  of  stem 
branches.  These  form  a  delicious  dish  when  cut 
before  the  flowers  appear.  This  race  of  cabbages 
is  known  as  cauliflower. 


146       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

Let  me  tell  you  something  interesting  about 
cauliflower.  When  the  fleshy  flower  stems  of 
certain  wild  cabbage  plants  were  first  noticed,  and 
thought  to  be  worth  developing  by  selection, 
it  was  the  gardeners  of  Italy  that  carried  the  work 
forward  until  the  older  varieties  of  what  we  call 
cauliflower  were  produced.  They  called  it  Broc- 
coli, and  that  is  the  Italian  name  for  cauliflower 
to-day.  All  along  the  shores  of  the  Mediter- 
ranean, and  all  through  the  year,  these  plants,  in 
many  varieties,  are  grown  for  the  markets.  It  is 
not  usual  to  hear  the  name,  Broccoli,  in  other 
countries,  though  the  name,  cauliflower,  is  every- 
where. It  is  used  by  itself,  as  a  vegetable  and 
combined  with  other  vegetables  in  pickles. 

The  headed  cabbages  form  a  great  group  that 
developed  along  the  line  of  improvement  of  the 
terminal  head.  The  sun  tinged  some  to  a  rosy 
color.  From  that  the  line  of  purple  cabbages 
came.  The  solid  globular  head  of  great  size 
is  one  type.  The  oval  head,  more  loose  and  soft, 
is  another.  Late  and  early  varieties  are  numerous. 
So  are  tender  and  hardy  kinds.  Heavy  coarse- 
fibred  kinds  are  grown  for  cattle.  There  are 
varieties  for  sauerkraut  and  others  for  crisp  salads. 
They  all  fall  into  two  groups,  based  upon  the 
leaves.  They  may  be  smooth  or  crinkled.  The 


LEAVES   AND    STEMS    WE    EAT  147 

latter  have  the  network  of  veins  so  swollen  that  the 
heads  are  not  solid,  like  the  smooth  sort,  and  the 
leaves  are  far  more  tender.  "Savoy  cabbage"  as 
this  group  of  crimped-leaved  varieties  are  called, 
have  sweeter, '  milder  flavor  than  the  smooth- 
leaved  varieties. 

Swelling  of  the  stem  was  noted  as  a  character 
in  some  wild  cabbage  plants,  and  when  thus  dis- 
torted the  stems  were  tender  and  edible.  Gradu- 
ally this  trait  has  been  emphasized  until  a  race  of 
turnip-like  plants  resulted.  The  leaves  grow  out 
of  the  top  and  sides  of  a  fleshy  globe  that  sits  on 
top  of  the  ground.  This  is  Kohl-rabi.  Another 
race  sprung  from  plants  that  had  their  roots 
enlarged.  The  Swedish  turnip,  or  rutabaga, 
has  its  leaves  clustered  at  the  top  of  a  thick 
"root-stem,"  that  sits  half  buried  in  the 
ground.  The  flesh  is  tender,  but  becomes 
stringy  when  left  too  long  in  the  ground.  The 
flesh  is  yellow.  The  other  turnip-rooted  cab- 
bages are  white. 

Suppose  a  wild  cabbage  had  no  tendency  to 
form  heads  or  turnips,  but  responded  to  cultiva- 
tion by  producing  more  and  better  spreading 
green  leaves.  Such  a  plant  was  the  parent  of  the 
kale,  a  tree  of  green,  intricately  curled,  succulent 
leaves,  used  as  a  pot  herb.  We  Americans  use 


148  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

kale  for  "greens,"  which  means  the  same  thing, 
exactly. 

Another  name  for  this  palm-tree  cabbage  is 
Borecole.  In  Europe,  large  kinds  are  grown  to 
feed  to  cattle.  In  our  southern  states  a  kale  is 
grown  that  bunches  its  upper  leaves  in  a  loose 
rosette  at  the  top,  while  the  rest  are  distributed 
about  the  elongated  stem.  These  lower  ones  are 
cut  for  greens  as  they  reach  good  size,  but  are 
still  tender.  At  the  end  of  a  summer  the  plants 
stand  as  bare  stalks,  each  crowned  by  the  small 
rosette  around  the  growing  point.  This  is  the 
Georgia  collard,  the  only  cabbage  that  thrives  in  a 
warm  climate. 

The  Chinese  cabbage,  or  Pe-tsai,  is  a  distinct 
species,  no  closer  to  the  wild  cabbage  of  Europe 
than  the  plum  is  to  the  cherry.  Its  curly  leaves 
have  white,  fleshy  stalks,  that  do  not  form  a  close 
head.  They  are  more  like  Swiss  chard  in  appear- 
ance, but  the  flowers  prove  it  a  cabbage.  Pak- 
choi,  another  variety,  is  taller,  with  whiter  stalks. 
Both  are  tender  and  of  delicate  flavor  if  cut  when 
young  and  boiled  like  kale.  The  ribs  alone  may 
be  served  like  asparagus.  In  American  gardens, 
these  Old- World  vegetables  are  a  delightful  sur- 
prise, easily  raised,  and  a  valuable  addition  to  our 
list  of  food  plants. 


LEAVES   AND    STEMS   WE    EAT  149 

No  vegetable  responds  more  quickly  to  good 
treatment  than  the  children  of  the  wild  cabbage. 
Rich  soil,  moist  and  fine  and  free  from  weeds, 
produces  the  finest  specimen  plants.  Quick 
growth,  uninterrupted  by  drought  or  neglect  of 
other  sort,  makes  the  biggest,  tenderest  leaves  and 
stalks,  and  they  have  the  most  delicate  flavor. 
The  cool,  moist  climate  of  England  makes  it  the 
best  place  in  the  world  to  grow  the  whole  cabbage 
group. 

If  the  gardener  neglects  his  cabbages  they  grow 
tough  and  rank  in  taste,  do  not  head  solidly,  and 
finally  burst  open  and  "bolt  to  seed."  Plant 
the  seeds  of  such  neglected  heads,  and  do  not 
tend  them.  The  next  crop  is  uglier  than  the 
last.  Save  seed  of  these  plants  to  sow,  and  let 
alone.  In  a  few  generations  what  are  our  cab- 
bages like?  They  have  gone  back  to  the  old  wild 
cabbage  form  of  the  British  coast.  The  gardener 
says:  "These  plants  revert  to  the  original  wild 

type." 

Just  so  your  kohl-rabi  and  turnip-rooted  cab- 
bages will  lose  the  plumpness  and  tenderness  and 
delicacy  of  flavor,  unless  fed  and  tended.  So  will 
the  cauliflowers  and  the  kales,  proving  that  their 
ancestors  were  the  same  as  those  of  the  headed 
cabbages,  which  alone  keep  the  family  name. 


I5O       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 
THE  ONION  FAMILY 

The  onion  is  a  native  of  Western  and  Central 
Asia,  from  which  territory  it  came  into  cultivation, 
and  spread,  in  various  forms,  through  Europe, 
and  eastward  to  China.  In  America,  Gray  de- 
scribed six  native  species  of  wild  onion,  and  one 
species  brought  from  Europe.  Dairymen  dread 
the  appearance  of  these  weeds  in  pasture  land, 
for  if  cows  crop  the  stringy  leaves,  milk  and 
butter  are  tainted  with  the  peculiar  onion 
flavor.  What  looks  like  a  patch  of  tender 
grass  in  open  woods  in  early  spring  often  turns 
out  to  be  wild  onion.  Once  established,  the 
colony  is  hard  to  keep  from  spreading  in  gardens 
and  fields. 

Improvement  in  this  species  has  made  the  bulb 
bigger,  more  tender  and  more  delicate  in  flavor. 
A  "scullion"  is  an  onion  whose  bulb  is  small,  and 
stem  thick,  an  individual  that  reverts  to  the  early 
wild  type.  Nobody  wants  it,  if  he  can  get  a  fat 
onion  with  a  slim  neck. 

The  biggest  onions,  often  a  pound  in  weight 
or  more,  grown  in  Mediterranean  countries,  are 
the  mild,  white  Spanish  variety.  The  Island  of 
Bermuda  grows  the  mild  Bermuda  varieties, 
almost  the  equal  of  the  Spanish  in  delicacy  and 


LEAVES   AND    STEMS   WE    EAT  151 

sweetness.  California  grows  both  kinds  in  the 
Imperial  Valley. 

The  "potato  onion"  is  a  form  that  substitutes 
for  the  single  bulb  a  number  of  irregular  and 
smaller  bulbs.  '  No  flowers,  seeds  nor  "sets"  are 
formed.  The  compound  bulb  is  separated  into 
its  divisions,  each  of  which,  if  planted,  produces 
a  cluster.  These  onions  are  fine  in  flavor,  but 
not  so  convenient  to  prepare  as  the  single,  large 
ones. 

Shallots  are  onions  of  the  compound  bulb 
group,  a  different  species,  however,  from  the  com- 
mon onion,  which  we  know  in  so  many  varieties. 
From  early  times  this  vegetable  has  been  used  for 
seasoning,  its  flavor  being  more  delicate  than  any 
old-fashioned  varieties  of  onions.  The  bulbs 
keep  the  year  round. 

Garlic  is  another  many-bulbed  onion,  native 
to  southern  Europe,  and  much  esteemed  there  as  a 
flavor,  copiously  added  to  stews  and  other  dishes. 
When  grown  in  northern  gardens  it  is  stronger 
and  more  burning  than  in  Italy.  So  a  rub  of  the 
salad  bowl  with  the  fresh-cut  surface  of  a  single 
"clove"  (little  bulb)  of  garlic  is  usually  quite 
enough  of  this  pungent  flavor  to  suit  our  taste. 

When  fully  grown,  the  garlic  is  pulled,  and 
the  dried  stalks  braided  together,  this  long  rope 


152  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

loaded  with  the  bulbs  is  displayed  in  grocers' 
doorways. 

Chives  are  tiny  onions  that  grow  tufted  together 
by  the  interlacing  of  their  fine  roots,  the  narrow 
leaves,  like  grass  blades,  making  the  clump  look 
like  a  patch  of  fresh,  green  turf.  The  bulbs  are 
about  the  size  of  grains  of  corn.  The  part  we  eat 
is  the  leaf,  which  is  a  delicate  seasoning  for  soups 
and  salads.  The  usual  plan  is  to  buy  a  pot  of 
chives  at  the  greengrocer's,  and  keep  it  to  shear 
as  needed.  The  cutting  off  of  the  tops  induces  a 
thick  growth  of  more,  and  the  pot  lasts  indefi- 
nitely. 

Outdoors,  chives  make  a  pretty  border  planting 
for  any  flower  bed.  The  tuft  may  be  separated, 
and  the  single  bulbs  set.  Each  soon  makes  a 
cluster  of  new  bulbs,  and  the  top  spreads. 

Leeks  are  onions  whose  leaf-bases  form  long 
cylinders  of  white,  tender  flesh,  rather  than 
globular  bulbs.  The]  parts  are  blanched  and 
delicate  in  flavor.  Like  other  onions,  they  are 
boiled,  as  a  rule,  and  often  served  with  a  cream 
sauce. 

Distinct  as  are  these  species  of  Allium,  yet  they 
are  joined  by  intermediate  forms  that  puzzle  the 
botanists  to  name  them.  The  devotee  of  the 
onion  merely  counts  them  all  on  his  ten  fingers, 


LEAVES   AND    STEMS   WE    EAT  153 

and  is  glad  that  there  is  not  one  less,  for  among 
the  cultivated  vegetables  there  is  not  another 
tribe  of  more  wholesome  foods  than  these. 

The  seed  of  the  onion  has,  within  its  outer 
coat,  a  mass  of  starch,  enclosing  the  bent  embryo, 
shaped  like  a  pencil.  The  tip  pushes  out  of  the 
shell,  after  the  moisture  and  warmth  in  the  soil 
start  it  to  growing.  From  a  certain  point  in  the 
tiny  shoot  the  growth  is  made  in  opposite  direc- 
tions. Downward  goes  the  root:  upward  goes 
the  stem.  But  this  is  the  end  attached  to  the 
seed,  and  that  is  lodged  in  the  warm  earth.  The 
seed  is  not  lifted  out  of  the  ground,  as  peas  and 
beans  are.  Instead,  the  growing  stem  of  the 
onion  forms  a  loop  which  comes  out  of  the  soil 
looking  like  a  very  white  hairpin,  sticking  straight 
up !  Out  of  the  bend  there  comes  a  leaf  that  rises 
from  the  place  where  the  root  struck  off  toward 
China.  By  the  time  this  leaf  is  ready  to  do  its 
duty,  the  seed  has  withered,  and  its  connection 
with  the  hump  of  the  stem  dwindles  to  a  thread. 
This  attenuated  whip-lash  breaks,  and  the  stem 
straightens,  and  one  by  one,  other  leaves  form. 

The  peculiarity  of  onion  leaves  is  that  they  are 
narrowly  tubular  above  ground,  and  fleshy  and 
spreading,  colorless,  and  still  tubular  just  below 
ground,  and  above  the  bunch  of  fibrous  roots. 


154       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

The  effect  of  such  growth  is  to  make  a  bulb-like 
vegetable  out  of  the  concentric  leaf  bases.  Count 
the  leaves  and  you  know  how  many  layers  there 
are  in  the  onion. 

One  season's  growth  is  needed  to  lay  up  store 
of  food  in  bulbs.  So  the  onion  rests  over  winter, 
and  if  left  where  it  grew,  starts  on  its  second 
spring  to  use  the  store  of  fleshy  leaf-bases  to  feed 
one  or  more  flower  stalks  which  rise  higher  than 
any  leaves  of  the  former  season.  These  stalks 
are  hollow,  green  and  swollen,  but  tapering  to  the 
dense  rounded  cluster  of  lavender,  or  white  flowers. 
These  are  followed  by  seeds.  After  the  seeds 
ripen,  the  bulb  is  withered,  the  plant  dead. 

Sometimes  little  fleshy  bulbs  appear  instead  of 
flowers.  These  are  constant  in  some  varieties, 
occasional  in  others.  These  are  called  "onion 
sets."  The  flowers  have  been  transformed  into 
bulblets  from  which  full-grown  onions  grow  the 
following  season. 

RHUBARB    OR    PIE-PLANT 

The  druggist  sells  a  bitter  tonic  extracted  from 
the  rootstocks  of  a  wild  plant  called  rhubarb, 
that  grows  in  Thibet  and  northwestern  China. 
The  acid  of  the  sorrels  is  in  the  whole  plant,  which 


LEAVES   AND    STEMS   WE    EAT  155 

has  come  into  cultivation  for  its  fleshy  leaf  stalks 
which  are  eaten  in  the  spring. 

Heart-shaped  leaves  a  foot  or  more  across  the 
blades,  stalks  two  inches  in  diameter,  and  more 
than  a  foot  long,  are  common  enough  in  kitchen 
gardens,  in  England  and  the  United  States.  The 
wild  plant  would  probably  be  very  disappointing 
in  the  role  of  "pie-plant."  It  has  taken  many 
years  of  cultivation  and  selection  to  get  the 
huge  stalks,  thin-skinned,  free  from  coarse 
fibres,  rich  in  flavor  and  color.  Only  the  richest, 
finest,  and  deepest  soil  produces  such  choice 
quality. 

Special  demand  for  rhubarb  comes  in  early 
spring.  The  growers  keep  up  the  cutting  of  the 
leaves  until  the  early  berries  come  to  market,  and 
people  are  tired  of  pie-plant  pie,  and  turn  gladly 
to  strawberry  short-cake.  With  the  approach  of 
hot  weather  the  stalks  become  more  corky  and 
lose  flavor. 

The  earliest  pie-plant  is  raised  by  the  gardener 
who  protects  the  crown,  and  stimulates  growth  by 
spreading  stable  litter,  or  other  heating,  ferment- 
ing fertilizer,  about  the  plant.  A  half  barrel  set 
over  the  plant  is  an  admirable  plan  for  the  small 
garden.  This  covered  wind  guard  conserves  heat, 
and  moisture,  and  the  darkness  makes  the  leaves 


156  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

stretch  up  for  light.  These  conditions  produce 
long,  blanched,  tender  stalks. 

After  the  rosette  of  leaves  is  fully  developed  the 
rhubarb  plant  sends  up  a  jointed  stalk  crowned 
with  a  series  of  axillary  flower  clusters,  that  pro- 
claim the  plant's  relationship  with  buckwheat, 
sorrels,  docks,  and  smartweed. 

The  way  to  make  new  plants  is  to  divide  the 
crown  and  roots.  About  four  years  is  as  long  as 
one  plant  should  be  allowed  to  grow.  After  this 
the  crowding  of  the  roots  makes  inferior  leaves. 


Plants  Whose  Roots  and  Tubers  We  Eat 


•    CHAPTER  VI 
THE  GARDEN  BEET  AND  ITS  KIN 

HAVE  you  ever  gone  out  into  your  garden  and 
pulled  a  good  panful  of  little  beets,  to  thin  the 
crowding  globular  roots,  and  incidentally  to  have 
for  dinner  a  dish  of  beets,  boiled,  tops  and  all, 
and  dressed  with  a  little  vinegar  to  temper  their 
sweetness?  Or  have  you  bought  from  market,  or 
from  your  favorite  vegetable  man  at  the  back 
door,  red  beets,  none  bigger  than  a  hen's  egg, 
smooth,  fine-grained  in  flesh,  that  came  to  the  table 
sliced  and  sizzling  in  their  ruddy  juice,  seasoned 
with  salt,  pepper,  sugar,  and  butter?  Another 
thrill  of  the  same  sort  comes  when  mother  opens, 
as  a  special  treat,  a  can  of  those  tender  little  beets 
she  put  away  in  spiced  vinegar.  Can  you  name 
a  vegetable  that  matches  young  beets  in  delicacy 
of  flavor,  or  in  beauty  of  color  when  served  on  the 
table? 

All  the  year  round  beets  are  to  be  had  in  market, 
for  they  are  kept  in  root  cellars  all  winter,  and 
there  are  spring,  summer,  and  fall  varieties  that 

159 


l6o  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

any  one  with  a  garden  can  raise  for  himself.  Some 
are  red,  some  white,  some  banded  red  and  white, 
when  cut  across.  Some  are  yellow,  some  banded 
yellow  and  red. 

To  avoid  the  stringiness  that  one  sometimes 
finds  in  beets,  the  gardener  plants  his  seed  in  rich, 
deep  soil,  and  keeps  his  plants  growing  rapidly. 
By  weeding  and  hoeing,  he  keeps  the  soil  in  good 
condition,  and  saves  the  moisture  in  it.  Water- 
ing is  necessary  in  dry  weather.  Then  he  must 
not  forget  to  thin  them  as  the  plants  become 
crowded,  and  to  pull  them  when  they  are  in  the  best 
condition  —  not  to  leave  them  past  their  tender 
stage. 

The  common  ways  of  cooking  beets  are  boiling 
and  baking.  More  commonly  we  boil  them  for 
later  use  in  salads,  and  pickled.  Baked  beets 
have  a  deeper  color,  and  firmer  texture  than  boiled 
ones.  In  no  case  should  the  skin  be  broken. 
The  stubs  of  the  leaves  should  be  left  on,  the  beets 
scrubbed  with  a  brush  and  rinsed.  Then  no  loss 
of  sugar,  flavor  or  color  will  be  suffered  in  cooking, 
and  skin  and  leaf  stubs  will  slip  off  easily  before 
the  slicing. 

Besides  the  garden  beets,  a  race  of  coarse-fleshed 
but  very  nutritious  beets,  called  rnangel-zvurzels, 
are  grown  as  a  field  crop  to  feed  to  stock.  They 


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ROOTS   AND   TUBERS   WE    EAT  l6l 

have  very  large  leaves,  and  the  roots  often  rise 
partly  out  of  the  ground. 

One  race  of  beets  has  been  developed  as  orna- 
mental plants,  the  foliage  beets ,  used  in  Europe  for 
carpet  bedding  and  borders  of  flower  gardens. 
The  ribs  and  veins  of  the  leaves  are  high-colored, 
and  the  varieties  differ  in  form  and  coloring. 

Even  the  garden  beets  are  second  in  importance 
to  the  sugar  beets •,  a  race  that  furnishes  the  sugar 
grown  in  temperate  climates. 

Sugar  beets  are  usually  small  varieties,  with 
small  tops,  the  flesh  white  or  yellow.  The  taper- 
ing root  goes  deep  and  drinks  in  the  soil  moisture, 
which  is  the  raw  material  out  of  which  the  leaves 
manufacture  the  sugar.  That  is  stored  away  in 
the  fleshy  root,  and  later  extracted  by  machinery. 

To  understand  how  the  beet  was  made  a  sugar- 
producing  plant  we  must  know  its  way  of  making 
seed.  It  is  biennial.  That  means  it  takes  two 
years  to  complete  its  growth.  The  first  year  is 
consumed  in  producing  a  leafy  top  and  a  fleshy 
root.  Then  the  top  dies  and  the  plant  rests. 
Next  spring  the  top  sends  up  a  flower  stem,  and 
the  flesh  of  the  root  is  absorbed  by  the  flowers  and 
seed  pod  as  they  form.  When  the  seeds  are  ripe 
the  root  and  stem  are  withered  and  dead.  They 
have  done  their  work.  Each  wrinkled  seed  case, 


l62  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

the  size  of  a  pea,  contains  several  small,  brown, 
kidney-shaped  seeds.  We  mistake  the  pod  for  a 
seed,  unless  we  open  one  and  explore  it. 

The  wild  parent  of  all  the  beets  is  a  weed  that 
grows  on  the  coasts  of  the  Mediterranean  Sea, 
and  also  on  the  Canary  Islands,  and  inland  in 
Eurasia  as  far  as  Persia  and  Babylon.  It  is  found 
in  muddy  shore  soil  in  England  and  parts  of  Scot- 
land and  Ireland. 

We  know  that  the  wild  beet  has  been  in  process 
of  cultivation  a  little  over  two  thousand  years. 
This  makes  the  family  line  of  these  vegetables 
very  short  compared  with  that  of  cabbages,  which 
have  been  grown  from  ancient  times,  possibly 
six  thousand  years. 

RADISHES 

A  familiar  and  very  popular  member  of  the 
Mustard  Family  is  the  radish,  grown  wherever  we 
see  a  garden  as  large  as  a  handkerchief.  One  of 
the  quickest  seeds  to  sprout,  and  the  earliest 
vegetable  ready  for  the  table  is  this  radish,  grown 
in  many  varieties,  to  suit  different  climates,  seasons, 
and  personal  preferences.  All  come  from  a  wild 
ancestor,  probably  native  to  Europe,  though  that 
matter  is  in  doubt.  The  cultivated  forms  some- 


ROOTS  AND  TUBERS  WE  EAT        163 

times  escape  from  gardens,  and  give  the  farmer 
trouble  enough  as  a  flourishing  weed.  When 
this  happens,  the  plants  make  more  head  than 
root,  and  "go  back"  to  their  ancestral  form. 

The  early  spring  radishes  are  little,  and  mature 
quickly.  In  salads,  the  leaves  are  often  used,  as 
well  as  the  fleshy  root,  when  the  earliest  crop  comes 
on.  Red  or  white,  globular,  olive-shaped  or  long, 
the  early  radishes  are  known  in  many  varieties. 

Summer  radishes,  varieties  that  best  withstand 
the  heat  and  drought,  and  winter  radishes,  big 
and  solid,  that  take  months  to  grow,  furnish  valua- 
ble food  supply  throughout  the  year.  Winter 
varieties  keep  without  sprouting  or  becoming 
hollow  or  withered  until  time  for  the  early  spring 
crop. 

Radishes  from  China  and  Japan  have  been 
introduced.  They  are  very  large,  but  tender  and 
mild,  and  very  easy  to  grow. 

The  seed  pods  of  radishes,  gathered  when  still 
crisp  and  tender,  are  a  fine  addition  to  home-made 
mixed  pickles.  The  half-formed  seeds  are  em- 
bedded in  the  pulp  of  the  pod;  seeds  and  all  have 
the  flavor  of  mustard,  without  any  of  the  strong, 
bitter  taste,  or  stringy  fibre  that  is  later  found. 

We  have  learned  the  use  of  the  pods  from  Euro- 
pean gardeners  who  grow  one  stringy-rooted  spe- 


164  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

cies,  the  rat-tailed  radish,  exclusively  for  its  succu- 
lent, twisted,  pencil-like  pods,  often  a  foot  long. 
These  are  eaten  raw  when  fresh,  or  pickled  for 
winter.  Warm  countries  of  the  Old  World  use 
radish  pods  verv  commonly.  We  are  just  learning 
to  do  so. 

HORSE    RADISH 

The  white,  fibrous  root  of  the  horse  radish  is 
grated,  seasoned  with  salt  and  sugar  in  vinegar, 
and  served  as  a  condiment,  with  meats,  especially 
roast  beef.  It  is  used  also  for  sauces  served  with 
fish  and  meats. 

The  plant  is  a  root  vegetable,  growing  wild  in 
Europe,  and  much  improved  in  size  and  quality 
by  garden  culture.  As  it  is  a  perennial,  some 
people  let  it  occupy  a  corner,  uncultivated  and 
undisturbed,  year  after  year.  When  they  go  to 
the  bed  and  dig  roots  in  spring,  they  complain 
because  of  the  crooked,  stringy  ones  they  find. 
To  get  good,  straight  ones,  care  is  needed. 

Rich,  deep  soil,  in  mellow  condition  is  planted 
with  root  cuttings  of  the  plant,  laid  horizontally 
or  slanting  toward  the  noonday  sun,  not  more 
than  two  inches  below  the  surface  of  the  soil. 
They  should  be  set  in  rows  a  foot  or  more  apart, 
and  three  feet  between  the  rows,  for  best  culture, 


ROOTS   AND   TUBERS   WE    EAT  165 

and  best  specimens.  After  a  whole  season  of 
growth,  roots  may  be  dug  that  are  fine  in  quality 
and  form.  Better  leave  them  till  they  have  made 
a  second  season's  growth. 

The  name,  radish,  comes  from  the  Latin,  radix, 
meaning  root.  Horse,  as  prefixed  to  plant  names, 
means  coarse,  big,  unfit  for  human  food,  though 
possibly  relished  by  horses.  Any  one  who  has 
tried  to  eat  fresh  horse  radish  knows  that  "a  very 
little  of  it  goes  a  great  way ! "  Grating  the  cleaned 
roots  is  a  tearful  occupation,  much  like  peeling 
onions.  The  reason  that  the  prepared  horse 
radish  one  buys  is  so  mild  is  that  it  is  adulterated 
copiously  with  grated  turnip,  a  poor  relation  that 
costs  less  than  the  genuine,  and  is  harmless,  though 
a  cheat  when  so  used.  If  one  does  not  raise  the 
plants,  it  is  best  to  buy  the  roots  and  do  the  grating 
at  home. 

TURNIPS 

If  they  had  been  turned  at  a  lathe  they  would 
scarcely  be  more  smooth  and  evenly  rounded  — 
the  turnips  we  see  harvested  in  the  fall  for  market, 
or  to  be  stored  for  winter  use.  The  name,  turnip, 
means  "turned. "  They  are  flattened,  or  long  and 
tapering,  or  globular,  but  all  are  round.  They 
would  roll  over  and  over,  in  one  direction. 


l66  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

Turnips  are  first  cousins  to  the  cabbages,  as  the 
flowers  and  seeds  plainly  show.  The  flavor,  too, 
calls  attention  to  the  kinship.  Wild  turnips  were 
cultivated  thousands  of  years  ago  to  make  their 
roots  larger  and  more  tender.  The  different 
shapes  were  later  in  being  developed.  White  and 
yellow  turnips  are  the  two  colors  grown.  This 
refers  only  to  the  flesh.  The  skin  may  be  of  these 
colors,  or  red,  gray,  or  black.  Varieties  grown  for 
human  food  are  sweet  and  tender,  if  they  are  not 
checked  in  growth  by  drought  or  lack  of  tilling. 
Field  turnips,  raised  for  cattle,  are  usually  coarser, 
not  so  well-flavored,  nor  so  tender.  But  all  have 
a  higher  food  value  than  potatoes,  because  they 
have  less  starch  and  more  flesh-forming  elements. 

The  turnip  is  not  a  fleshy  root,  like  the  sweet 
potato,  nor  a  fleshy  stem,  like  kohlrabi,  but  a 
combination  of  root  and  stem.  Notice  the  clus- 
tered leaves  at  the  top.  They  are  attached  to  the 
shortened  stem  of  the  plant,  which  is  called  the 
"crown."  This  stands  at  the  surface  of  the 
ground  and  performs  all  the  stem  duties,  the  part 
below  ground  doing  duty  as  the  root  of  the  plant. 

The  English  farmer  sets  more  store  by  his  turnip 
crop  than  the  American  farmer,  and  it  is  rather 
hard  to  understand  why.  The  Cornell  Experi- 
ment Station  raised  25  tons  an  acre  of  cattle 


ROOTS   AND   TUBERS  WE    EAT  167 

turnips  in  1904.  The  soil  was  a  good  loam,  well 
cultivated.  This  crop  was  harvested  four  months 
after  the  seed  was  sown,  and  the  ground  was  clear 
for  another  crop.  This  is  certainly  a  satisfactory 
return  for  the  investment  of  money,  time,  and 
labor. 

Often  farmers  prefer  to  leave  the  turnips  in  the 
ground  for  stock  to  crop  through  the  open,  mild 
winter,  or  even  to  dig  through  snow.  The  whole- 
some green  food  is  so  craved  by  cattle  toward 
spring.  Sheep  are  especially  fond  of  turnips,  and 
they  like  to  dig  for  them,  too. 

In  digging  turnips  to  store  for  the  winter,  farm- 
ers have  the  leafy  tops  chopped  off  before  the  roots 
are  buried  in  sand  or  boxed  in  the  airy  root  cellar. 
Delicious  "turnip  salad'7  is  made  of  the  tender 
sprouting  tops  of  stored  roots,  late  in  winter. 
Young  turnips  are  also  used,  tops  and  all,  as  a  pot 
herb. 

Nobody  knows  when  the  wild  turnip  came  into 
cultivation.  But  we  do  £now  that  the  Spanish 
explorers  brought  them  across  the  sea  and  estab- 
lished them  in  Mexico  in  1586.  They  came,  too, 
with  the  earliest  settlers  of  New  England  and 
Virginia.  Some  early  observer  wrote  that  the 
Jamestown  colony  raised  better  turnips  than  were 
raised  in  England,  whose  gray  skies  and  moist, 


l68  THE    BOOK    OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

cool   atmosphere   are  especially  adapted  to  this 
crop. 

There  is  not  much  better  treatment  of  the 
patient  British  soil,  that  has  borne  crops  con- 
tinuously for  hundreds  of  years  than  the  "Norfolk 
rotation,"  by  which  turnips,  barley,  clover,  and 
wheat  are  the  crops  that  follow  each  other  in  order. 
The  crop  that  most  robs  the  soil,  wheat,  is  pre- 
ceded by  clover,  the  crop  that  takes  nitrogen  from 
the  air,  and  gives  it  back  to  the  soil. 

CHICORY 

A  ragged,  sprawling  weed  has  caught  the  eyes 
of  every  boy  or  girl  who  tramps  along  country 
roads,  for  it  opens  its  blue  flowers  early  in  the 
morning,  and  closes  them  about  noon.  The  result 
is  that  the  plant  is  lovely  in  the  morning,  and  ugly 
the  rest  of  the  day. 

This  chicory,  or  succory,  is  called  "wild  bache- 
lor's button. "  It  is  scattered  as  a  wild  plant  over 
Europe  and  America,  in  many  places  escaped  from 
cultivation.  It  belongs  to  the  Composite  Family 
with  the  dandelions  and  the  lettuces  and  the  sun- 
flowers. Its  bitter  juice  has  medicinal  properties. 
In  many  communities  it  still  is  the  standard  home 
remedy  for  jaundice  and  other  liver  complaints. 

We  do  not  hear  of  chicory  as  a  commercial  crop 


ROOTS   AND    TUBERS    WE    EAT  169 

in  this  country,  but  we  shall  in  time.  In  Europe 
it  is  grown  extensively  for  the  roots.  These  fleshy 
tubers  are  used  as  a  substitute,  or  adulterant,  for 
coffee. 

The  roots  are  cleaned  by  washing,  then  trimmed, 
sliced  and  dried  in  kilns,  roasted  until  dark  brown, 
and  then  ground.  This  prepares  it  for  mixing 
with  ground  coffee.  As  chicory  costs  one  fifth 
as  much  as  coffee,  the  more  there  is  added  to  the 
latter,  the  greater  the  profit.  Calling  the  mix- 
ture coffee  constitutes  a  deception,  of  course,  even 
though  the  more  chicory  used,  the  better  some 
people  like  the  drink.  Indeed,  chicory  is  some- 
times used  alone  as  a  beverage.  It  has  a  bitter, 
aromatic  flavor,  and  considerable  more  body  and 
color  than  an  equal  amount  of  ground  coffee. 

If  you  are  prejudiced  against  chicory,  and  sus- 
pect adulteration  of  your  coffee,  nothing  is  easier 
than  to  detect  the  fraud.  Pour  a  teaspoonful  of 
the  ground  "coffee"  into  a  tumbler  of  water. 
Stir  it.  In  a  short  time  the  chicory  will  become 
softened,  color  the  water,  and  sink  to  the  bottom. 
The  coffee  will  remain  hard,  and  float  on  the  sur- 
face for  a  long  time. 

Since  the  public  demands  chicory,  and  we  know 
it  lacks  the  harmful  properties  of  coffee,  it  is  a  crop 
no  one  needs  be  ashamed  to  raise.  It  is  a  staple 


I7O  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

product  of  farms  in  many  agricultural  sections  of 
Europe,  and  recently  is  becoming  established  on  a 
profitable  basis  in  this  country.  A  factory  is 
always  the  centre  of  a  chicory-growing  com- 
munity. 

The  farmer  who  grows  chicory  near  a  factory 
can  get  about  $7  a  ton  for  the  crop.  The  average 
yield  is  ten  tons  to  the  acre.  Allowing  half  of  the 
gross  returns  for  cost,  which  is  enough,  he  has  a 
profit  of  $30  per  acre  clear.  This  estimate,  based 
upon  averages  carefully  made  from  actual  experi- 
ments by  farmers,  should  encourage  timid  folk 
to  embark  in  the  new  enterprise,  if  opportunity 
comes  their  way. 

Certain  turnip-rooted  varieties  of  chicory  are 
grown  as  a  table  vegetable,  to  be  baked  or  boiled 
like  turnips.  Another  group  of  varieties  de- 
veloped from  wild  chicory  have  succulent  stalks 
and  tender,  finely  cut  leaves,  used  for  salads. 
One  must  like  the  tang  of  young  dandelion  leaves 
to  enjoy  chicory  as  a  salad  or  a  pot  herb.  Boiled 
and  served  with  vinegar  and  other  seasoning,  it  is 
delightful  in  early  spring.  The  turnip-rooted 
varieties  are  used  for  producing  winter  salads. 
"Barbe  de  Capucin,"  and  "Witloof,"  are  two 
chicory  salads  one  finds  all  winter  in  any  good 
market  in  American  cities.  We  have  recently 


ROOTS   AND   TUBERS   WE    EAT  IJl 

learned  from  our  foreign  neighbors  to  appreciate 
these  two  new  things.  The  methods  the  gardeners 
use  to  get  them  are  interesting,  and  also  very 
simple. 

Any  plant  which  grows  a  turnip-like  root  ex- 
pects to  use  the  food  stored  up  in  this  fleshy 
portion  to  send  up  a  flower  stalk  next  season,  and 
mature  a  crop  of  seeds.  See  how  the  gardener 
thwarts  the  chicory's  plan  for  perpetuating  its 
race.  He  wants  leaves,  not  seeds.  So  he  begins 
in  summer,  when  the  tops  are  flourishing  and  the 
roots  swelling.  He  cuts  off  the  top,  a  little  above 
the  ground.  The  root  hastens  to  send  up  a  stock 
of  small  leaves  to  do  the  work  of  those  that  are 
gone.  In  autumn  the  largest  leaves  are  again 
docked,  the  roots  shortened,  and  the  plants  taken 
up,  and  set  close  together  in  boxes  of  rich  soil. 
When  frost  comes,  watering  ceases,  and  the  boxes 
are  covered.  As  needed  they  are  taken  into  a 
dark,  warm  cellar  where  each  root  is  able  in  a 
short  time  to  produce  a  head  of  crisp,  blanched 
leaves.  These  are  the  barbe  de  Capucin  salads, 
the  particular  delight  of  the  French.  Each 
root  will  produce  two  crops  of  leaves  six  inches 
long. 

"Witloof,"  the  favorite  winter  salad  of  the 
Belgians,  is  grown  in  a  different  way.  The  roots 


172  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL   PLANTS 

are  buried  in  trenches  filled  with  layers  of  manure. 
Each  one  produces  a  long  head  of  leaves  that  con- 
sist largely  of  blanched  blades,  with  just  a  frill  of 
webbing  near  the  top.  A  second  crop  follows  the 
first  cutting.  If  the  roots  are  brought  out  of  the 
trenches,  and  kept  in  the  dark,  warm  cellar,  the 
second  head  resembles  barbe  de  Capucin. 

American  gardeners  have  acquired  the  knack 
of  growing  these  salads,  and  Americans  are  learn- 
ing to  like  both  of  them. 

SALSIFY 

One  of  the  root  vegetables  that  keeps  company 
with  the  parsnip  by  staying  in  the  ground  all 
winter,  and  being  none  the  worse  for  the  freezing 
it  gets,  is  salsify,  called  from  its, flavor,  the  vegeta- 
ble oyster  plant.  The  crown  above  the  slender 
roots  bears  a  bunch  of  narrow  leaves,  like  blades 
of  coarse  grass.  The  English  housewife  takes 
the  tender,  inner  leaves  and  uses  them  for  salads. 
We  use  only  the  fleshy  roots,  first  scraping  off  the 
thin,  grayish  skin,  then  boiling  them,  sliced,  with 
seasoning  of  butter,  pepper,  and  salt.  We  add, 
perhaps,  a  dash  of  onion  juice,  for  an  extra  flavor. 
Although  salsify  is  not  grown  by  the  average 
gardener  in  this  country,  it  is  found  in  any  good 


ROOTS   AND   TUBERS    WE    EAT  1 73 

market,  and  those  who  are  acquainted  with  it  con- 
sider it  one  of  the  most  delicate  and  wholesome  of 
winter  root  vegetables. 

The  salsify  plant  surprises  us  by  starting  growth 
early  in  the  second  spring,  and  sending  up  a  flower 
stalk  two  or  three  feet  high.  This  stalk  is  crowned 
with  a  loose  head  of  purple  flowers,  like  daisies 
or  little  asters,  followed  by  numerous  seeds,  winged 
for  flight. 

The  wild  salsify  still  grows  in  meadows  and 
pastures  along  the  Mediterranean.  A  yellow- 
flowered  species,  native  to  parts  of  Asia,  is  some- 
times seen  in  gardens.  The  seeds  blow  away  from 
cultivated  plants  and  come  up  in  neglected  land. 
These  plants  have  stunted  roots  not  much  better 
than  those  of  wild  ones.  The  fact  that  salsify 
"goes  back"  so  quickly  to  the  wild  form,  when  it 
escapes  from  gardens,  is  a  sign  that  it  has  not 
long  been  in  cultivation. 

In  warm  countries  salsify  does  poorly,  and  may 
become  a  serious  pest  if  allowed  to  scatter  its  seeds 
broadcast.  In  colder  countries  it  does  best.  The 
gray,  damp  climate  of  England  exactly  suits  it, 
and  the  English  gardeners  grow  it  to  perfection. 
There  is  little  freezing  weather  there,  so  it  is  easy  to 
dig  the  roots  from  the  soil  as  they  are  needed  to 
cook.  They  are  best  buried  in  sand  in  root  cellars, 


174  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

if  the  ground  freezes  hard  as  it  does  in  our  north- 
ern states. 

JERUSALEM  ARTICHOKE 

The  American  Indians  learned  —  who  knows 
how  long  ago?  —  that  a  certain  wild  sunflower 
produces  rootstocks  like  those  of  the  dahlia,  and 
the  sweet  potato,  underground.  The  interesting 
thing  about  these  tubers  is  that,  roasted  or  boiled, 
they  are  good  to  eat.  When  the  white  men  came 
they  learned  from  friendly  Indians  to  dig  up  the 
nourishing  wild  roots  and  cook  them  as  they  did 
potatoes.  I  do  not  know  when  or  where  the  plant 
came  to  be  called  the  "Jerusalem  artichoke." 
It  is  not  very  close,  botanically  speaking,  to  the 
globe  artichoke,  and  the  edible  parts  of  the  two 
plants  set  them  still  farther  apart  than  do  their 
composite  flowers. 

It  seems  a  pity  that  we  Americans  take  so  little 
pains  to  get  acquainted  with  vegetables  that  are 
not  as  familiar  already  as  beans.  We  have  no 
patience  to  like  a  new  kind  with  a  strange 
flavor.  We  compare  this  artichoke  with  the 
potato,  and  declare  it  inferior.  So  it  may  be, 
but  why  compare  it  with  that  highly  improved 
species  ? 

The    French    cook   will    roast    or    boil    these 


ROOTS   AND   TUBERS   WE    EAT  175 

tubers,  or  make  a  salad  of  fine  quality,  and 
different  from  all  others.  If  you  persevere,  you 
will  come  to  enjoy  the  new  flavor,  and  your 
table  has  gained  a  wholesome  and  distinct  vege- 
table. 

The  Jerusalem  artichoke  is  used  to  taking  care 
of  itself.  It  thrives  on  gravelly  soil,  too  dry  for 
other  crops,  and  in  shady  places.  The  quality 
of  tubers  produced  under  such  conditions  is  not 
the  best.  Good  tillage  in  mellow  soil  wonder- 
fully improves  the  quality  and  quantity  of  the 
crop.  Quick  growth  produces  sweeter,  tenderer 
tubers.  We  should  judge  the  vegetable  by  its 
best  samples.  It  is  more  productive,  more  easily 
grown  and  more  easily  harvested  than  the  potato 
crop. 

Almost  any  farm  has  some  land  on  it  not  good 
for  much  but  these  artichokes.  Turn  the  pigs 
into  the  patch  and  they  root  out  and  fatten  on  the 
roots.  They  are  excellent  green  food  for  other 
stock  in  winter.  Chickens  thrive  on  them,  ground 
fine  and  mixed  with  their  grain.  The  tubers  are 
not  harmed  by  leaving  them  in  the  ground  all 
winter. 

The  new  crop  is  raised  by  planting  cuttings  of 
tubers,  each  with  an  eye,  just  as  we  do  with 
potatoes,  when  spring  comes  again. 


176  THE    BOOK    OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

PARSNIPS 

The  wild  parent  of  garden  parsnips  has  a  long, 
slim  root  that  tapers  above  ground  into  a  long, 
leaf-bearing  neck.  It  is  one  of  the  oldest  root 
vegetables  to  be  cultivated.  Various  writings 
of  ancient  times  make  frequent  mention  of  the 
plant  and  its  uses.  The  improvement  of  the 
species  was  in  the  size  and  succulence  of  the  root, 
toward  a  shorter,  thicker  neck  and  body.  The 
yield  increased  and  the  fleshy  roots  were  more  ten- 
der and  easier  to  get  out  of  the  ground.  The 
richer  and  mellower  the  soil,  the  quicker  the 
growth,  and  the  bigger  the  crop. 

When  the  English  colonists  established  them- 
selves on  the  eastern  coast  of  this  country  they 
brought  with  them  seeds  of  garden  vegetables, 
including  the  parsnip.  They  were  surprised  to 
find  that  the  Indians  were  already  growing  this 
vegetable,  and  could  not  remember  when  it  was 
introduced  among  them.  It  is  known  that  it  was 
brought  to  the  West  Indies  and  later  established 
in  Mexico  by  the  early  Spanish  explorers.  Possi- 
bly the  Indians  got  it  from  this  source  during  the 
hundred  years  between  the  coming  of  Columbus 
and  the  landing  of  the  Pilgrims. 

The   English   gardener  has   more   foresight,   I 


CJ 

I 


Garden  beets  are  among  the  chef's  most  decorative 
vegetables 


A  great  variety  of  delicious  dishes  are  made  out  of  the 
homely  squash 


ROOTS  AND  TUBERS  WE  EAT       177 

think,  and  more  patience  than  the  American.  He 
knows  that  the  sowing  of  parsnips  in  spring,  and 
the  cultivation  of  the  plants  will  bring  a  crop  of 
tender,  sweet  roots,  in  prime  condition,  at  a  time 
when  most  fresh  foods  for  man  and  beast  are  gone. 
What  if  he  has  no  stock  to  feed,  and  there  are  more 
parsnips  than  his  family  needs?  His  neighbors 
will  be  eager  to  buy,  as  the  late  winter  brings  them 
to  the -end  of  their  supply  of  root  vegetables.  The 
owners  of  cattle,  pigs,  and  horses  appreciate  a  chance 
to  get  parsnips  for  them.  Poultry,  too,  thrives  on 
these  roots. 

Parsnip  seeds  are  grown  for  a  drug  they  yield, 
and  some  gardeners  grow  their  own  supply  for  next 
planting.  The  second  year  is  seed  time  for  all  plants 
that  form  fleshy  roots  in  the  first.  Set  out  a  pars- 
nip in  good  soil  and  watch  the  top  send  up  among 
the  leaves  the  branching  stem  with  its  crowding 
umbrellas  of  little,  greenish  flowers,  much  like  the 
white  ones  for  its  cousin,  the  wild  carrot.  The 
seeds  are  flat  and  round  with  a  thin  frill  on  each 
that  enables  it  to  fly. 

CARROTS 

The  wild  parent  of  garden  and  field  varieties 
of  carrots  is  a  rampant  weed  in  most  parts  of 


178  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL   PLANTS 

Europe,  and  has  invaded  America,  via  England. 
No  greater  nuisance  distresses  the  farmer  than 
this  plant,  for  it  takes  possession  of  pasture  and 
meadow  land,  and  runs  out  the  grass  and  clover. 
Only  the  plow  and  hoe  keeps  it  from  over-running 
field  and  garden,  for  its  seeds  are  abundant,  and 
the  wind  sows  them. 

Have  you  seen  the  roadside  and  hillside  white 
in  late  summer  with  the  lace  umbrellas  of  the  wild 
carrot?  You  have  called  them  " Queen  Anne's 
lace."  The  cluster  is  made  up  of  hundreds  of 
small,  white  flowers,  in  a  flat-topped  cluster,  the 
big  umbrella  made  of  numerous  little  ones.  Each 
arm  of  the  much-branched  stalk  bears  flowers. 
After  blossoming,  the  umbrella  turns  wrong-side- 
out,  forming  a  tight  ball  while  the  seeds  are  ripen- 
ing. Each  seed  is  ridged  and  roughened  by 
prickly  hooks,  by  which  it  is  able  to  catch  a  ride 
on  a  cow's  tail,  for  instance,  if  one  brushes  near  by. 
The  stems  are  brittle;  so  the  heads  are  blown  about 
by  the  wind,  and  the  seeds  gradually  sown  wher- 
ever they  travel.  The  vitality  of  the  seeds  lasts 
for  years.  If  they  do  not  germinate  the  first  year, 
they  may  later  on.  No  wonder  the  wild  carrot 
seems  to  inherit  the  earth,  or  a  large  part  of  it! 
No  wonder  it  is  hated  cordially  by  farmers,  and  is 
considered  one  of  their  most  dangerous  foes. 


ROOTS   AND   TUBERS   WE    EAT  179 

Plant  wild  carrot  seed  in  rich  garden  soil  and 
the  stringy,  white  root  of  the  roadside  weed  be- 
comes more  fleshy.  Save  seed  of  this  favored 
plant,  and  see  still  more  fleshy  roots  on  the  plants 
that  come  from  this  seed.  Vilmorin,  a  great 
French  horticulturist,  got  a  very  creditable  garden 
carrot  in  the  third  generation.  Just  as  surprising 
is  the  change  that  comes  to  neglected  plants  of  the 
best  varieties:  three  generations  of  running  wild 
will  reduce  the  fleshy-rooted,  tender  carrot  to  the 
stringy,  strong-flavored  type  of  its  wild  original 
species.  It  reverts  promptly. 

Carrots  have  two  distinct  layers  of  flesh  under 
the  thin  skin.  The  outer  layer  is  richer  in  food 
elements  and  less  fibrous  than  the  inner  one,  which 
gardeners  call  the  core.  The  effort  to  reduce  this 
inferior  middle  portion  and  increase  the  nutritious 
outer  flesh  has  succeeded  in  developing  a  coreless 
group  of  varieties.  In  shape,  and  colors,  carrots 
offer  considerable  range  for  our  choice.  White 
ones  are  grown  for  cattle.  For  the  table,  carrots 
are  red,  orange,  or  yellow.  From  long,  tapering 
roots  they  range  to  round,  turnip  shapes.  Some  of 
the  choicest  kinds  are  small  and  shaped  like  a 
frankfurter.  There  are  early,  medium,  and  late 
varieties;  the  last  are  among  the  best  winter 
vegetables  for  storage  in  root  cellars  or  in  pits. 


ISO  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

The  Greeks  cultivated  the  wild  carrots  over  two 
thousand  years  ago.  Their  writers  talk  about  it. 
In  France  and  England,  improvement  has  gone 
on  nearly  as  long,  until  carrots  are  as  common 
vegetables  as  potatoes.  They  are  constantly  used 
in  stews  and  soups  for  flavoring,  and  boiled  to  be 
served  alone  or  with  other  vegetables  in  salads. 
The  very  best  way  to  cook  tender  young  carrots 
is  to  steam  them  in  their  skins,  removing  these 
before  serving  with  a  rich  white  sauce. 

An  abundant  supply  of  early,  half-grown  carrots 
come  north  from  truck  farms  of  Florida,  while  it 
is  yet  winter.  These  are  among  the  most  attrac- 
tive things  in  market  to  those  who  have  learned 
to  enjoy  the  carrot  flavor  at  its  best. 

Carrot  seeds  contain  an  aromatic  oil,  used  for 
flavoring  liqueurs.  The  red  juice  of  highly  colored 
varieties  is  used  to  color  butter  and  sometimes  as 
a  dye. 

POTATOES 

A  family  of  plants  is  a  group  of  different  kinds 
which  bears  certain  general  resemblances  to 
each  other.  The  flowers  are  often  the  parts  that 
exhibit  these  family  characteristics,  when  other 
features  are  so  modified  that  the  members  seem 
very  far  apart.  The  fruits  of  closely  related 


ROOTS   AND   TUBERS   WE    EAT  l8l 

plants  may  be  so  changed  by  cultivation  that  they 
are  scarcely  recognizable  as  relatives  of  their  wild 
parents,  even. 

The  family  (to  which  the  potato  belongs  is 
called  Solanaceae.  In  it  are  seventy  genera,  and 
these  include  fifteen  hundred  species.  The  genus 
Solanum  covers  the  potatoes,  the  egg  plants,  the 
nightshades,  and  the  bittersweet.  The  genus 
Capsicum  includes  the  red  peppers.  Lycopersi- 
cum  is  the  tomato  genus.  Nicotiana  is  tobacco. 
Datura  is  the  Jamestown  weed  —  or  " Jimson 
weed."  A  genus  includes  petunias.  Another,  the 
ground  cherries. 

All  these  plants  are  alike  in  having  alternate 
leaves,  regular,  five-parted  flowers,  with  a  single 
pistil,  two-celled,  maturing  into  a  capsule  or  a 
berry,  with  numerous  seeds. 

The  potato  plant  grows  to  maturity  in  one  sea- 
son and  produces  clusters  of  pale  purplish  or  white, 
wheel-shaped  flowers,  followed  by  soft,  green  ber- 
ries filled  with  very  bitter  pulp,  that  surrounds 
the  little  seeds. 

Underground,  the  potato  has  a  good  supply  of 
fibrous  roots.  Certain  strong  branches  of  the  roots 
end  in  fleshy  tubers.  These  have  eyes,  or  dimples, 
with  a  bud,  or  a  cluster  of  buds,  in  each.  Later 
these  buds  prolong  themselves  into  leafy  stems. 


l82       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

This  makes  it  plain  that  the  tubers  are  under- 
ground stems,  not  roots.  They  act  for  the  plant 
as  storage  places  for  reserve  food. 

Many  potato  plants  have  abandoned  the  habit 
of  flowering,  and  rely  for  the  continuation  of  the 
race  upon  the  tubers,  which  are  dormant  through 
the  winter,  but  sprout  when  spring  comes.  The 
potato  plant  dies  like  any  annual.  The  tuber 
grows  the  second  spring  like  the  root  of  a  biennial, 
such  as  the  beet  and  parsnip.  The  farmer  cuts 
up  the  "seed  potatoes"  into  pieces  with  a  generous 
portion  of  the  starchy  flesh  to  each  good  "eye. " 
He  plants  these  pieces,  and  each  bud  sends  up  a 
plant.  These  "cuttings"  produce  plants  like  the 
parent.  Potato  seeds  rarely  do  this.  The  experi- 
menting seedsman  plants  potato  seeds  in  hope  of 
discovering  among  the  plants  a  new  and  desirable 
variety.  Once  in  a  hundred  trials  he  may  get 
something  worth  while.  It  is  an  interesting  game. 

High  in  the  Andes  of  Chile  and  Peru  the  potato 
grows  wild.  It  is  common,  too,  along  the  coast. 
Related  species  are  abundant  in  the  highlands  of 
Central  America  and  Mexico. 

The  Spanish  invaders  probably  brought  it  to 
Europe  during  the  sixteenth  century,  and  it  spread 
rapidly  through  the  southern  countries.  These 
same  explorers  may  have  been  the  means  of  estab- 


ROOTS  AND  TUBERS  WE  EAT        183 

lishing  the  potato  as  a  food  crop  among  the  Indians 
that  tilled  the  soil,  for  it  was  not  known  to  them 
before  the  white  men  came. 

Sir  Walter  Raleigh  introduced  both  potato  and 
tobacco  into  England.  He  grew  potatoes  'in  his 
own  garden.  Long  after  it  had  been  grown 
as  a  garden  vegetable,  potato  culture  widened 
in  importance  until,  during  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury, Scotland  was  raising  potatoes  as  a  field 
crop,  and  the  French  people  were  awake  to  its 
value. 

The  name,  Irish  potato,  universally  used  to  dis- 
tinguish this  vegetable  from  the  sweet  potato, 
came  from  the  fact  that  the  potato  saved  Ireland 
from  the  famines  that  recurred  with  terrible 
certainty  until  the  potato  was  introduced.  Now 
other  crops  fail,  but  the  potato  stands  by. 

Occasionally  the  potato  crop  is  a  failure.  In 
1845  a  disease  called  blight  attacked  the  foliage 
of  the  plants,  preventing  the  formation  of  the 
tubers.  This  caused  a  potato  famine  over  all 
this  country  and  Europe.  No  such  thing  can 
happen  again,  for  spraying  the  field  with  Bordeaux 
mixture,  a  solution  of  blue  stone  and  lime,  kills 
the  fungus,  and  saves  the  foliage.  Paris  green, 
added  to  the  spray,  kills  by  poisoning  the  potato 
bug,  which  is  the  chief  insect  enemy  of  the  crop. 


184      THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

It  is  possible  to  control  the  diseases  and  pests  that 
caused  the  failures,  partial  and  complete,  of  the 
potato  crops,  up  to  the  time  that  spraying_methods 
were  perfected. 

In  Revolutionary  times  but  two  varieties  of 
potatoes  were  generally  known,  a  red  and  a  white 
one.  It  was  not  known  then,  as  now,  that  the 
vegetable  is  more  important  than  most  other 
garden  and  field  crops,  because  it  can  be  so  cheaply 
raised,  and  so  is  within  the  reach  of  the  poorest. 
By  improvement  in  methods  of  cultivation  the 
yield  became  constantly  greater,  and  quality  im- 
proved. The  species  tends  to  vary  greatly,  so 
new  varieties  were  developed,  and  put  on  the  mar- 
ket for  "seed."  Many  thousands  of  varieties  are 
in  cultivation  now. 

Any  one  interested  can  create  new  varieties,  or 
improve  old  ones.  A  few  horticulturists  in  each 
of  the  leading  civilized  countries  have  devoted 
themselves  to  the  raising  of  potatoes  from  seed. 
From  their  experiments  the  best  new  varieties 
have  come  into  existence. 

Americans  like  big  potatoes :  Europeans  like  little 
ones.  We  like  white  ones:  they  like  yellow  and 
red-fleshed  ones.  The  flavor  of  a  fine  potato  is 
more  considered  by  the  French  and  English  than 
by  us.  Our  potatoes  depend  for  flavor  on  the 


ROOTS  AND  TUBERS  WE  EAT       185 

seasoning  we  add,  for  we  eat  the  starchy  part  of 
the  tuber. 

The  manufacture  of  starch  and  alcohol  from 
potatoes  is  a  great  industry.  Feeding  potatoes  to 
stock  is  a  good  practice.  It  puts  a  fresh  vegetable 
element  into  the  dry  rations  in  winter  that  is  both 
palatable  and  wholesome.  Tons  of  potatoes  put 
away  in  pits  are  opened  and  used  in  this  way. 
Other  economical  methods  include  turning  pigs 
into  a  patch  of  potatoes  to  root  out  the  crop  and 
fatten  on  it. 

Like  the  other  nightshades,  potatoes  have  a 
bitter,  poisonous  sap  in  their  stems  and  leaves. 
If  a  tuber  is  exposed  to  the  sun  it  turns  green,  and 
its  bitter  taste  warns  us  of  the  danger  of  eating  it. 
Only  potato  beetles  can  eat  the  green  parts  of  the 
plant  with  impunity. 

When  Sir  Walter  brought  the  potato  over  and 
presented  the  new  vegetable  to  his  Queen,  he  little 
thought  the  act  might  endanger  his  life.  The 
plant  was  grown  in  the  royal  kitchen  gardens,  and 
the  green  leaves  gathered  and  set  before  Her 
Majesty,  Queen  Elizabeth,  in  the  form  of  a  salad! 
Imagine  how  it  tasted!  Sir  Walter  was  sent  for, 
and  faced  the  charge  of  trying  to  poison  the  Queen! 
He  saved  himself  by  explaining  that  only  the 
tubers  were  fit  to  eat. 


l86  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

Cases  of  poisoning  of  children  sometimes  result 
from  their  eating  the  green  balls  that  enclose  the 
seeds,  and  look  so  good  when  served  on  the  table 
in  the  playhouse.  Timely  warnings  will  prevent 
such  occurrences. 

Careful  planters  soak  the  potato  cuttings  in 
dilute  formalin  before  planting,  to  destroy  the 
spores  of  a  potato  disease  called  "scab."  Two 
hours  in  the  liquid  insures  healthy  potatoes  from 
the  "seed. "  That  means  a  clean  crop  that  brings 
a  good  price.  The  cost  of  the  bath  is  very  slight, 
and  the  work  is  almost  nothing.  But  the  planting 
of  scabby  seed  potatoes  insures  a  crop  that  is 
scabby  and  a  poor  yield,  because  of  the  disease. 
Grain  smuts  are  killed  by  soaking  the  seed  in  the 
same  preparation  of  formalin. 

A  potato  is  a  dormant  shoot,  set  with  buds,  each 
with  store  of  nourishment  sufficient  to  feed  its 
growth  until  it  shall  have  roots  and  leaves  to 
gather  its  own  living  from  the  soil  and  the  air. 
If  winter  passes,  and  the  tuber  is  not  planted,  it 
begins  to  grow  wherever  it  happens  to  be.  In  the 
cellar  bin  the  long,  colorless  shoots  wind  around 
in  search  of  light.  If  there  is  a  window,  they  all 
reach  toward  it.  On  the  table  in  the  light  the 
shoots  grow  fast  and  produce  green  leaves,  using 
the  water  that  is  in  the  fleshy  substance,  if  none 


ROOTS   AND   TUBERS    WE    EAT  1 87 

is  supplied.  Before  the  old  tuber  withers  away 
new  ones  may  be  formed.  So  the  plant  renews 
its  youth,  undiscouraged  by  adverse  conditions, 
that  would  make  most  plants  give  up  and  die. 

Grate  a  raw  potato  after  washing  and  peeling  it, 
and  pour  cold  water  over  the  pulp.  Drain  and 
squeeze  all  the  liquid  possible  into  a  glass  tumbler. 
At  first  it  is  milky,  then  a  white  sediment  appears, 
and  the  liquid  above  it  is  clear.  Dry  the  sediment, 
and  it  cracks  like  dried  mud.  It  is  caked  potato 
starch,  like  the  laundry  starch  we  buy.  The  clear 
fluid  that  you  pour  off  of  the  starch  contains 
albumen,  like  white  of  egg.  Heat  the  liquid  and 
this  coagulates.  With  the  albumen  is  a  small 
amount  of  sugar,  and  fat,  and  gum.  These  are  the 
elements,  combined  with  starch,  that  make 
potatoes  so  important  a  food.  Dried,  the  potato 
would  be  about  the  equivalent  of  rice,  and  a  much 
more  condensed  food  than  it  is.  Three  quarters 
of  the  bulk  of  potatoes  when  they  are  dug  must 
be  counted  out.  It  is  water. 

To  get  the  very  best  out  of  a  fine  potato,  one 
should  cook  it  in  its  jacket.  Scrub  it  with  a  brush, 
rinse  away  all  dirt,  and  bake  it.  Or  steam  it,  by 
placing  it  in  a  colander  over  a  kettle  of  boiling 
water.  If  one  must  peel  potatoes,  let  it  be  the 
thinnest  possible  paring  that  is  removed.  Under 


1 88       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

the  skin,  that  slips  off  so  easily  from  new  potatoes, 
lie  the  most  nutritious  elements.  A  thick  paring 
throws  away  these,  and  sends  the  inner  mass, 
chiefly  starch,  to  the  table. 

Peeled  potatoes  should  be  plunged  into  hot 
water,  so  that  the  albumen  coagulates  and  seals 
up  all  the  contents  when  cooking  begins.  One 
gets  by  this  method  all  the  flavor  and  the  value  of 
the  tubers.  The  common,  wasteful  method  is  to 
peel  away  the  part  in  which  the  best  of  the  pota- 
to lies,  soak  them  in  water,  then  put  them  on  to 
boil  in  cold  water.  The  water  drained  off  when 
potatoes  are  "done"  contains  certain  acids,  be- 
sides other  undesirable  elements.  For  this  reason, 
it  has  no  food  value,  and  should  never  be  saved. 

SWEET   POTATO 

The  Spanish  name,  Patata,  comes  from  the 
Peruvian,  Papa,  name  of  a  wild  morning-glory, 
native  to  tropical  South  America,  and  China. 
The  Spaniards  learned  to  eat  the  sweet  tubers  that 
the  Incas  cultivated  on  the  west  slopes  of  the 
Andes.  They  are  now  grown  in  the  warm  parts 
of  all  countries,  including  the  East  and  West 
Indies.  China  cultivated  the  vegetable  some 
centuries  before  the  Christian  Era,  so  we  can 


ROOTS   AND    TUBERS    WE    EAT  189 

hardly  claim  it  exclusively  as  an  American  plant. 
It  is  one  of  those  cosmopolitan  "weeds,"  whose 
value  was  independently  discovered  on  both  sides 
of  the  globe,  by  hungry,  primitive  men,  who  nib- 
bled any  fleshy  root  that  tasted  good,  and  laid  it 
on  the  fire  to  soften  it  by  roasting  or  parching. 
The  next  step  was  to  cultivate  it.  So  the  size 
of  the  tubers  has  been  increased  and  improved  by 
selection  and  better  tillage,  until  we  have  almost 
one  hundred  varieties  to  choose  from,  and  tubers 
weighing  from  one  to  twelve  pounds  are  produced. 

The  range  of  this  tropical  plant  has  been  ex- 
tended until  any  region  that  has  a  growing  season 
of  four  months  free  from  raw  winds  and  frost, 
can  raise  the  crop.  The  best  soil  is  a  loose,  sandy 
loam,  well-drained.  Growth  must  proceed  with- 
out interruption. 

The  sweet  potato  plant  is  a  creeping  vine,  related 
to  the  bindweed,  dodder,  cypress  vine,  and  morn- 
ing-glory, as  its  coiling  stems  and  trumpet-shaped 
flowers  prove.  The  seeds  are  borne  in  dry,  two- 
celled  capsules,  more  familiar  to  us  in  the  morning- 
glory  and  moon-flower.  Underground,  the  sweet 
potato  forms  the  tubers,  which  are  true  roots,  not 
stems,  as  in  the  "Irish"  potato.  No  eyes  are 
seen  on  the  sides  or  ends  of  the  sweet  potato,  but 
fibrous  roots  instead.  The  grower  puts  the  tubers 


I9O  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL    PLANTS 

into  a  bed  of  sand  to  sprout  fully  assured  that 
buds  will  be  formed,  and  stems  rise.  This  pecul- 
iarity of  a  root  tuber,  the  formation  of  buds,  is  not 
commonly  met  with.  It  is  found  in  raspberry 
and  apple  and  other  fruits.  Plant  a  bit  of  root, 
and  a  shoot  rises  to  form  a  new  plant.  Cut  down 
and  try  to  destroy  some  trees,  and  leafy  shoots 
rise  from  the  tips  of  roots  left  in  the  ground.  All 
such  plants  arise  from  buds  that  are  called  adven- 
titious, and  occur  without  definite  order.  They 
are  abnormal  and  unusual.  The  sweet  potato  has 
come  to  be  propagated  by  this  method  of  root- 
cuttings. 

The  sweet  potato  is  rich  in  starch  and  sugar 
and  has  a  distinctive  flavor  that  makes  it  a  favorite 
root  vegetable  in  many  lands.  The  Northerner 
likes  it  to  come  to  the  table  mealy  and  dry;  the 
Southerner  likes  it  waxy,  or  even  sticky.  A  favor- 
ite Southern  mode  of  cooking  serves  the  "yam" 
in  a  syrup.  Up  North,  butter  and  salt  season  it  to 
taste.  So  the  Southern  grower  is  disappointed,  if 
he  sends  any  but  dry,  mealy  varieties  to  Northern 
markets. 

Quantities  of  sweet  potatoes  are  canned.  Some 
are  evaporated.  Sweet  potato  meal,  glucose  and 
even  alcohol  are  commercial  products.  The  vines 
are  cured  and  fed  as  hay.  Small  and  damaged 


ROOTS   AND   TUBERS   WE    EAT 

tubers  are  fed  to  stock.  Bruising  and  cutting 
must  be  carefully  guarded  against  in  digging  the 
crop,  for  the  soil  is  full  of  fungous  germs,  and  decay 
is  quickly  started  in  a  tuber  with  skin  broken. 

We  are  fortunate  to  have  this  vegetable  as  a 
staple  crop.  In  England  it  is  not  grown;  a  few 
varieties  are  hardy  around  Paris.  The  Europeans 
who  have  learned  to  like  them  must  depend  on 
imported  potatoes.  Of  our  great  crop,  a  small 
part  is  sent  abroad.  The  North  African  states 
send  their  surplus  to  European  cities. 

"Yam"  is  a  Southern  name,  applied  locally  to 
some  yellow-fleshed  varieties  of  sweet  potato. 
"Potato"  is  the  name  used  in  the  West  Indies. 
"Irish,"  or  "white"  potatoes,  the  true  potato  is 
called  to  distinguish  it. 

The  true  yam  is  a  root  tuber,  like  our  sweet 
potato  in  composition  and  mode  of  growth,  but 
belonging  to  an  entirely  different  family.  It 
originated  in  China,  and  from  there  has  been 
introduced  into  Europe.  It  is  hardy  and  whole- 
some. Its  fault  seems  to  be  that  the  tubers  go 
so  deep  that  they  are  difficult  to  lift  when  mature. 
They  are  not  yet  a  market  vegetable  in  the  United 
States,  though  a  few  amateurs  grow  them. 


Plants  Whose  Seed -Vessels  We  Eat 


•CHAPTER  VII 
THE  ORANGE  AND  ITS  KIN 

CITROUS  fruits,  which  take  their  descriptive 
adjective  from  the  citron,  include  also  the  orange, 
lemon,  lime,  and  pomelo,  or  grape  fruit.  The 
leathery,  yellow  skin,  pitted  with  dots  that  con- 
nect with  oil  glands,  and  yield  a  pungent,  aromatic 
fragrance,  is  a  family  trait  always  recognized. 
The  pulp  that  surrounds  the  seeds  is  enclosed  in 
papery  divisions  that  part  easily,  making  the  fruit 
easy  to  handle  after  the  skin  is  slipped  off.  The 
trees  are  evergreen,  not  large,  but  very  productive; 
the  foliage  glossy,  and  peculiar  in  being  compound, 
with  but  one  leaflet.  The  flowers,  waxy  and 
white,  and  very  fragrant,  appear  while  the  fruit 
is  ripening. 

First  in  this  great  family  of  semi-tropical  fruits 
stand  the  orange.  Native  of  Asia,  the  wild  orange 
was  cultivated  early,  and  carried  into  India  and 
China  with  the  drift  of  emigration  that  set  east- 
ward, while  it  also  moved  westward  into  Mediter- 
ranean regions,  and  established  itself  in  the  sunny, 

195 


196  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

mild  climate  of  Italy,  Spain,  and  the  south  of 
France.  Then  came  the  spread  of  orange  culture 
in  the  West  Indies,  Florida,  and  Mexico.  And 
last,  but  greatest,  the  establishment  of  the  orange 
as  a  commercial  crop  in  California,  an  industry 
which  has  made  a  profound  impression  on  the 
orange  market  of  Europe  and  America. 

The  remarkable  thing  about  the  orange  of 
southern  California  is  that  the  fruit  is  picked  ripe 
from  the  tree,  packed  with  the  utmost  care, 
shipped  in  special  refrigerator  cars,  or  compart- 
ments in  vessels,  and  delivered  to  the  consumer 
in  distant  countries  without  change  or  deteriora- 
tion in  quality.  It  may  be  picked  through  a  long 
season,  so  as  to  supply  the  market  at  almost  any 
season  of  the  year.  The  growers  in  this  great 
new  orange  region  of  the  world  are  people  of  high 
intelligence,  who  have  founded  their  industry  on 
the  best  knowledge  obtainable.  The  experience 
of  Old  World  growers  has  helped  methods  in  use; 
but  their  prejudices  and  traditions  have  not  ham- 
pered the  progress  of  the  new  horticulture. 

Just  as  good  horticultural  intelligence  developed 
the  orange  industry  in  Florida.  The  advantage 
of  nearness  to  the  great  seaboard  cities  of  the  East, 
and  cheaper  transportation  by  sea,  gave  a  great 
stimulus  to  the  planting  of  orchards,  and  in  1894 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  197 

six  millions  boxes  went  to  market.  Then  came  the 
freeze  in  December,  and  another  in  February,  and 
orchards  north  of  the  middle  of  the  state  were 
ruined  or  badly  damaged.  Large  plantings  in 
southern  Louisiana  were  utterly  destroyed.  This 
sad  lesson  taught  growers  the  limits  within  which 
orange  culture  can  safely  be  pursued,  and  it  left 
the  way  clear  for  California  to  supply  the  defi- 
ciency, by  ever  greater  production. 

The  demand  for  oranges  is  large  in  the  United 
States.  California  supplies  80  per  cent,  of  it. 
The  importation  of  Mediterranean  oranges  has 
largely  given  place  to  West  Indian,  and  Ameri- 
can fruit.  England  uses  an  ever-increasing  quan- 
tity of  California  oranges  of  the  finest  grades. 

The  Washington  Navel  is  the  great  commercial 
orange.  It  is  seedless,  with  a  funny  little  wrinkled 
orange,  no  bigger  than  a  berry,  tucked  into  the 
blossom  end.  The  divisions  of  the  fruit  are 
many,  the  walls  thin,  and  the  flesh  sweet  and  fine- 
flavored.  The  trees  are  small,  but  well-shaped 
and  very  prolific,  beginning  to  bear  early. 

In  1870,  a  resident  of  Bahia,  Brazil,  sent  to  the 
Department  of  Agriculture  in  Washington  three 
cuttings  of  the  seedless  orange,  the  principal  vari- 
ety of  that  country,  grown  for  a  century  or  more, 
but  not  especially  good,  and  unknown  in  this 


198  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

country,  because  it  is  not  a  good  fruit  for  ship- 
ping. The  cuttings  were  overlooked  for  some 
time,  then  sent  to  a  grower  at  Riverside.  Two  of 
the  scions  lived  when  grafted  on  an  orange  tree. 

Upon  this  new  fruit  the  orange  industry  rests. 

The  parent  tree  of  the  Washington  Navel  orange 

is  now  growing  and  bearing  fruit  in  front  of  the 

Glenwood  Inn,  while  trees  by  thousands  represent 

the  offspring  of  cuttings  it  has  yielded  in  years  past. 

Strangely  enough,  the  soil  and  climate  of  south- 
ern California  makes  of  this  variety  a  different 
fruit  from  the  South  American  form.  One  of  the 
chief  merits  of  the  Washington  Navel  is  its 
keeping  qualities  in  overland  transit. 

The  harvest  of  oranges  in  California  begins  in 
time  to  supply  the  Christmas  trade.  Navels  are 
picked  and  shipped  from  November  till  May. 
Valencias,  a  European,  seeded  variety,  the  best 
and  most  popular  late  orange,  from  June  to  Sep- 
tember. Malta  Blood,  a  red-fleshed,  small  fruit 
of  excellent  quality,  from  March  to  June. 
Mediterranean  Sweets,  of  good  size  and  few  seeds, 
fine  in  flavor  and  texture,  from  April  to  July. 
St.  Michaels,  fine,  juicy  fruit  with  very  thin  rind, 
May  to  July.  These  are  the  standard  varieties 
grown  for  market. 

Tangerines  and  Mandarin  oranges  are  loose  from 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  199 

the  skin  when  ripe,  and  easily  parted  into  sections 
without  spilling  any  juice.  They  are  sweet  and 
pleasantly  aromatic,  grown  chiefly  for  local  de- 
mand. 

Kumquats  are  tiny  olive-shaped  oranges,  an 
inch  long,  thick-skinned,  with  scant  room  for  pulp. 
They  are  eaten,  skins  and  all,  or  made  into  con- 
serves. They  are  a  dwarf  species  from  Japan. 

The  marmalade  of  commerce  is  made  of  the 
bitter  orange,  an  Arabian  variety,  taken  into  Spain 
by  the  Moors  in  the  ninth  century,  and  cultivated 
chiefly  in  the  neighborhood  of  Seville.  The  dark 
skin  is  candied  for  export  to  England  and  other 
northern  countries.  Quantities  of  the  fresh  fruit 
are  used  in  English  homes  and  factories,  for  the 
Englishman  must  have  orange  marmalade  wher- 
ever he  goes. 

The  Citron  whose  thick  inner  rind  is  candied 
and  preserved  in  Sicily,  Corsica,  Italy,  Spain,  and 
Portugal,  grows  also  in  the  West  Indies  and  Brazil. 
It  grows  wild  in  northern  India,  from  which  region 
it  has  come  into  cultivation  in  India  and  China. 
It  is  not  edible  when  fresh. 

The  Lemon,  a  close  relative  of  the  orange,  origi- 
nated in  India  or  China,  if  tradition  is  to  be  be- 
lieved. It  has  followed  the  orange  over  the  world, 
but  is  a  trifle  less  hardy.  Its  place  in  the  list  of 


2OO  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

useful  fruits  is  distinct,  and  lemon-growing  is  an 
important  industry  in  Florida  and  southern  Cali- 
fornia. England  gets  lemons  chiefly  from  the 
Mediterranean  citrous  districts  and  the  West 
Indies. 

Lemons  lose  quality  by  hanging  on  the  trees 
after  they  reach  fair  size.  They  are  picked  green, 
and  from  that  moment  "must  be  handled  as  care- 
fully as  eggs. "  In  dark,  but  well- ventilated  store- 
houses the  fruit  is  slowly  cured  and  attains  its 
yellow  color.  The  next  step  is  the  washing  that 
removes  dirt  that  the  oily  surfaces  accumulate. 
From  the  washing  machines,  the  fruit  is  dried,  and 
then  shipped  or  stored.  There  is  no  reason  for 
hurrying  lemons  to  market.  Fruit  picked  in 
December  will  keep  till  July,  if  properly  stored  in 
airy  boxes. 

The  Lime  is  a  small  green  lemon  with  sour  juice 
that  furnishes  a  most  refreshing  beverage.  The 
home  of  the  species  is  northern  India,  whence  it 
has  been  carried  into  the  West  Indies  and  Mexico, 
in  this  country,  and  widely  scattered  in  Asia  and 
Europe.  England  imports  a  great  deal  of  lime 
juice.  The  varieties  come  true  from  seed.  The 
plants  are  dwarfs,  and  are  often  planted  as  hedges. 

The  Pomelo,  called  "grape-fruit,"  because  of 
the  grape-like  fruit  clusters,  is  the  largest  of  all 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  2OI 

citrous  fruits,  and  its  popularity  grows  apace. 
It  is  an  improved  form  of  the  shaddock,  a  native 
of  the  Malay  Archipelago,  and  the  South  Sea 
Islands,  coarse,  bitter,  and  sour  in  flesh,  and  weigh- 
ing from  ten  to  twenty  pounds ! 

The  few  years  of  selection  and  cultivation  have 
developed  a  smooth-skinned  pomelo,  full  of  juice 
that  is  sprightly,  but  not  bitter,  and  with  a 
minimum  of  "rag, "  the  tough  tissue  that  separates 
the  compartments  of  pulp.  Nothing  can  be  more 
delicious  than  such  a  fruit,  served  with  enough 
sugar  to  temper  its  tartness.  Orange  trees  are 
readily  changed  over  to  grape-fruit  by  budding  or 
grafting,  or  vice  versa.  So  any  one  in  California  or 
southern  Florida  who  has  overcome  his  first  dis- 
taste for  the  new  thing  can  supply  his  home  table 
by  converting  two  or  three  orange  trees  to  the 
new  fruit.  It  takes  only  a  season  or  two  to  effect 
the  transformation. 

GRAPES 

The  oldest  cultivated  fruit  is  the  grape,  a  plant 
related  to  the  Virginia  creeper.  Six  thousand 
years  it  has  furnished  the  human  race  with  food 
and  drink.  In  the  old  countries,  wine  comes  first 
among  the  important  products  of  "the  vine. "  To 


2O2  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

us,  grapes  are  important  first  as  food.  We  grow 
them  to  eat  fresh,  out  of  hand,  as  a  table  dessert, 
and  to  cook.  Dried,  they  are  a  valuable  food 
called  raisins  and  dried  currants.  Bottling  the 
unfermented  juice  is  a  great  industry  in  the  United 
States.  Wine  comes  last,  for,  though  California 
grows  the  wine  grapes  of  Europe,  and  makes  wine, 
Americans  are  not  wine-drinkers,  to  any  great 
degree,  and  Europe  counts  the  wines  of  other 
countries  inferior  to  those  of  her  southern  coun- 
tries, where  wines  have  been  the  most  important 
product  for  centuries. 

It  was  natural  that  the  early  settlers  of  the 
Atlantic  coast  should  bring  the  grapevines  of 
Europe  with  them,  and  try  to  raise  vineyards  and 
make  wine.  They  failed,  and  they  could  not  guess 
why.  So  they  turned  their  attention  to  the  native 
grapes,  which  grew  in  considerable  abundance  and 
variety  in  different  regions.  By  selection,  and 
tillage,  some  of  the  best  grape  varieties  grown  to- 
day have  been  developed  from  the  wild,  native 
kinds. 

The  Concord,  one  of  the  richest-flavored,  and 
most  popular  of  eastern  grapes,  was  discovered  as 
a  chance  seedling  on  his  grounds  by  Ephriam  Bull, 
a  resident  of  Concord,  Massachusetts,  in  1843. 
He  recognized  the  merit  of  the  fruit,  and  propa- 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  203 

gated  this  "sport"  by  cuttings.  Now  its  range  is 
extensive,  and  the  fruit  is  shipped  even  to  Cali- 
fornia, whose  markets  are  loaded  with  the  richest 
dessert  grapes,  of  the  sorts  that  Europeans  grow 
under  glass. 

The  Concord  is  the  parent  of  the  Worden, 
Moore's  Early,  and  a  number  of  other  fine,  but 
less  famous  varieties.  But  the  original  vine  still 
flourishes  where  it  was  discovered  seventy-five 
years  ago. 

The  Catawba,  another  fine  grape,  was  found  wild 
in  the  North  Carolina  woods  a  year  earlier  than 
Ephriam  Bull's  notable  discovery  in  New  England. 
It  has  given  rise  to  another  famous  seedling,  the 
Diana,  which  is  more  popular  than  its  illustrious 
parent. 

In  the  American  woods  nearly  two  dozen  dis- 
tinct species  of  grape  have  been  found.  In 
Europe,  southern  Asia  and  North  Africa  native 
species  have  given,  in  the  course  of  thousands  of 
years  of  culture,  over  a  thousand  distinct  cultural 
varieties.  But  the  one  species  that  is  parent  of 
the  wine  grapes  is  Vitis  vinifera.  No  other 
country  compares  with  American  in  wealth  of 
species  of  native  grapes. 

The  soft,  juicy  native  grapes  contrast  distinctly 
with  the  thick-meated  grapes. of  Europe.  These 


2O4      THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

are  in  recent  years  quite  common  in  the  markets  of 
all  cities,  being  grown  and  shipped  in  refrigerator 
cars  from  California  vineyards.  The  Flame 
Tokays,  Cornichons,  Mission,  and  Muscats  are 
among  these  well-known  and  deservedly  popular 
fruits. 

Some  of  the  finest  varieties  of  cultivated  grapes 
have  been  developed  from  crosses  of  native 
American  species  with  the  European  vine.  New 
kinds  have  been  thus  produced  outright.  The 
game  of  making  hybrids  is  played  by  carrying  the 
pollen  of  one  species  to  the  pistils  of  another,  and 
preventing  self-pollenation.  Then  we  plant  the 
seed  set  as  a  result  of  this  hand-work  at  crossing. 
It  succeeds  best  with  species  that  do  not  grow 
alongside  of  each  other,  naturally.  The  wine 
grape  and  the  American  fox  grape  have  produced 
some  of  the  most  successful  of  these  artificial 
crosses;  and  the  crossing  of  a  hybrid  with  a  na- 
tive has  produced  still  better  varieties.  Some  of 
the  good  varieties  are  believed  to  be  natural  hy- 
brids, crosses  produced  by  the  agency  of  insects 
or  the  wind,  instead  of  the  voluntary  effort  of 
experimenting  horticulturists. 

The  grape  phylloxera  is  a  plant  louse  that  feeds 
upon  the  roots  of  the  vines,  causing  the  plant  to 
die.  It  was  the  cause  of  death  to  the  European 


SEED-VESSELS    WE    EAT  2O5 

vines  first  brought  over  in  colonial  times.  Intro- 
duced into  Europe,  it  swept  the  vineyards  away, 
and  ruined  the  wine  industry.  No  grape-growing 
country  has  escaped  a  visitation  of  this  plague 
of  the  vine. 

But  study  of  the  ruined  vines  revealed  the  cause 
of  trouble.  No  one  could  devise  any  means  of 
killing  an  insect  enemy  that  works  underground. 
But  the  wild  American  vines,  that  showed  ability 
to  resist  the  attacks  of  the  phylloxera,  were  taken 
to  Europe  and  planted.  Then  the  varieties  that 
had  been  destroyed  were  grafted  on  the  hardy  roots. 
Thus  the  immune  grape  acted  as  nurse  and  guar- 
dian to  the  tender  wine  grapes,  and  the  enemy 
was  defeated.  Rugged  native  species  saved  the 
high-bred  varieties  from  ruin. 

Wines  are  made  by  crushing  the  grapes  and  let- 
ting the  juice  ferment.  The  skins  may  be  fer- 
mented in  the  juice  and  thus  make  red  wines,  that 
take  their  color  from  the  pigment  under  the  skin. 
Juice  alone  is  used  in  making  white  wines.  The 
acid  in  grapes  gives  the  wine-keeping  qualities. 
The  sugar  produces  alcohol.  During  fermenta- 
tion, a  grayish  or  reddish  crust  forms  in  the  wine 
vat.  This  crystalline  substance  is  "argol." 
Refined,  by  dissolving  and  filtering  processes,  it 
becomes  "cream  of  tartar,"  used  in  medicine, 


2O6  THE   BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

effervescent  drinks,  and  in  baking  powders. 
After  being  drawn  from  vats  into  barrels,  the 
wines  are  kept  for  some  years  to  ripen,  if  the  best 
qualities  are  being  made.  The  older  the  wine,  the 
better  it  becomes. 

Raisin-culture  centres  in  Fresno  County,  Califor- 
nia, where  the  fruit  of  certain  fleshy,  sweet  vari- 
eties are  dried  in  the  sun,  on  large  trays.  Only 
regions  of  continuous  sunshine  can  make  raisins. 

Valencia  and  Malaga,  cities  in  Spain,  are  cen- 
tres of  great  raisin-districts  in  Europe.  The  finest 
grades  are  produced  by  partially  cutting  the  stem 
of  each  fine  cluster,  and  then  cutting  away  of  all 
leaves,  so  that  the  sun  hastens  the  drying,  and 
the  sap  supply  is  partially  cut  off.  The  more  usual 
method  is  to  cut  the  bunches  and  lay  them  on 
trays  in  the  sun. 

Persia  and  neighboring  countries  produce  quanti- 
ties of  raisins  for  home  use  and  for  European 
markets.  The  Zante  currants  and  Sultana  seed- 
less raisins  are  both  made  of  small  sweet  grapes 
of  Greece  and  Asia  minor. 

CORE   FRUITS 

In  the  great  Rose  Family  we  find  a  number  of 
the  most  important  genera  of  trees,  whose  seed 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  2O7 

envelopes  man  has  developed  by  the  arts  of  horti- 
culture into  luscious  and  wholesome  fruits.  Be- 
side trees,  the  family  embraces  shrubs,  herbs,  and 
vines  known  for,  their  fruits  as  useful  and  beautiful 
additions  to  the  fruit  and  flower  garden. 

The  core  fruits  are  the  apples,  pears,  quinces, 
the  medlar,  and  loquat.  The  seeds  are  borne  in  a 
papery,  five-celled  ovary,  surrounded  by  the 
fleshy  "pome,"  which  we  eat.  The  most  im- 
portant of  these  core  fruits  is  the  genus  Malus,  the 
apple. 

APPLES 

The  parent  of  the  apples  of  the  orchard  is  a 
scraggly  tree  with  sour,  crabbed  fruit  enclosing  the 
core  and  seeds.  It  grows  wild  in  the  southeastern 
parts  of  Europe,  and  the  neighboring  countries  of 
Asia  Minor.  From  these  parts  it  moved  with  the 
drift  of  population  westward,  and  was  gradually 
improved,  until  now  it  is  grown  throughout  the 
North  Temperate  Zone,  and  is  spreading  in  South 
America,  Africa,  and  Australia.  Along  with  civili- 
zation, the  apple  has  marched  for  unnumbered  cen- 
turies, the  little  nubbins  found  among  the  remains 
of  the  early  Lake-dwellers  greatly  improved  upon 
by  the  apples  of  classical  literature.  The  varieties 
shown  at  a  horticultural  fair  in  any  country  to- 


2O8  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

day  are  all  lineal  descendants  of  that  first  wild 
type. 

The  method  of  multiplying  a  good  variety  has 
been  by  grafting  (or  budding)  a  scion  of  the  desired 
kind  on  a  healthy  apple  tree  whose  fruit  may  not 
be  counted  so  desirable.  The  scion  unites  with  the 
stock,  and  through  it  a  branch  is  produced  that 
bears  the  fruit  desired.  On  small  trees,  the  top 
is  made  by  the  grafting  process.  One  scion  is 
set  on  top  of  the  main  stalk,  and  through  this 
twig  all  growth  is  changed  over  to  the  new 
variety.  The  root  and  stem  minister  to  the 
bearing  top  which  is  not  their  own,  but  a  relative 
by  marriage! 

To  find  out  in  the  easiest  way  what  that  ancient 
parent  apple  was  like,  we  must  stop  on  the  wayside 
and  taste  the  fruit  of  a  tree  that  has  sprung  from  a 
chance  seed  of  a  core  thrown  away  by  some  travel- 
ler who  passed  by,  years  ago.  Gnarled  is  the  tree 
and  insipid  the  fruit!  Plant  an  orchard  with  seeds 
of  your  favorite  apples,  and  wait  for  them  to  bear. 
The  wild  apple  of  the  wayside  had  quite  as  good 
fruit  as  that  you  will  get.  Seedling  apples  are  un- 
certain for  the  orchardist.  He  makes  his  choice 
of  varieties  and  plants  trees  grafted  to  these.  The 
plant  breeder  may  grow  seedling  apple  trees  in 
hope  of  discovering  one  in  a  thousand  that  bears 


The  growth  and  yield  of  a  grapevine  is  a  miracle 
repeated  each  year 


§• 


S 

- 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  2OO, 

good  fruit.  He  plays  a  game  with  Nature.  Once 
in  a  lifetime  a  fine  seedling  variety  is  discovered. 
Such  is  the  Wealthy  apple,  discovered  in  a  Minne- 
sota experimental  orchard  some  years  ago.  The 
Fameuse,  or  Snow  apple,  comes  true  from  seed. 
For  centuries  it  has  been  passed  along  by  seeds 
carried  and  sent  into  new  territory,  in  Canada 
and  the  United  States,  from  its  home  in  France, 
until  it  is  distributed  across  the  country. 

The  native  wild  apples  of  this  country  are  to  be 
found  in  the  woods  to-day;  we  call  them  wild  crab- 
apples.  The  eastern  species  is  the  only  one  the 
early  botanists  saw.  Later,  another  kind  was 
found  from  New  Jersey  to  Florida,  and  westward, 
—  the  narrow-leaved  crab.  In  the  central  states 
the  Iowa  crab,  and  in  the  northwest  the "  Oregon 
crab,  make  four  species  of  wild  apples  in  North 
America.  Siberia  has  a  wild  crab,  parent  of  the 
cultivated  crabs  we  grow  in  gardens.  These  little 
apples  are  distinct.  We  use  them  for  jellies  and 
sweet  pickles. 

Notably  good  fruit  has  resulted  from  crossing 
different  species  of  wild  apples.  Some  natural 
crosses  have  furnished  good  kinds.  The  Indians 
used  the  wild  apples  for  food,  and  were  quick  to 
adopt  the  varieties  introduce^  by  settlers.  In 
North  and  South  America  remnants  of  Indian 


2IO  THE    BOOK    OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

apple  orchards  still  persist,  where  their  cornfields 
have  been  obliterated  years  ago. 

Apples  grow  far  north,  but  they  require  a  hot 
summer  to  come  to  good  size  and  color  and  fine 
flavor.  The  climate  makes  Nova  Scotia  one  of 
the  best  apple  countries  in  the  world. 

Canada  is  a  great  apple  region.  Vermont  and 
northern  New  York,  with  their  cold  winters  and 
deep  snows,  produce  apples  of  the  finest  quality. 

Great  apple  regions  in  the  Northwest  and  in 
Colorado,  California,  and  other  states  are  supply- 
ing an  ever-increasing  demand  for  the  fruit  in  the 
states  west  of  the  Rocky  Mountains.  Some  of  the 
finest  apples  in  New  York  and  London  are  grown 
in  the  Northwest. 

PEARS 

We  have  no  native  species  of  pear,  though  we 
cultivate  a  number  of  varieties,  imported  from 
Europe,  and  some  fine  kinds  have  originated  here. 
The  original  home  of  the  wild  pear  was  not  far 
from  that  of  the  wild  apple,  but  it  has  spread  in  two 
directions  until  it  is  a  common  forest  tree  in 
France,  and  from  the  Chinese  forests  it  reaches 
north  to  Manchuria. 

Special  success  has  attended  the  efforts  of  the 


SEED-VESSELS    WE    EAT  211 

French  and  Dutch  horticulturists  to  improve  this 
fruit.  Choice  varieties  were  developed  by  monks 
who  trained  the  trees  on  walls  so  that  the  ripening 
fruit  should  have  full  benefit  of  the  sun's  heat,  and 
defence  against  cold  winds.  This  method  pro- 
duces fine  pears  in  England,  which  has  too  cool  a 
climate,  and  too  little  sun  to  ripen  pears  in  any 
other  way. 

QUINCES 

In  the  gardens  of  New  England  you  will  find 
dwarf  trees  that  blossom  with  lovely  pink  clusters 
of  flowers  like  wild  roses,  and  bear  golden  apples 
in  the  fall.  Taste  one,  and  its  flesh  is  too  hard  to 
eat.  This  is  the  old-fashioned  quince,  cultivated 
from  the  earliest  times,  when  it  came  into  cultiva- 
tion from  the  wilds  of  North  Africa,  and  southern 
Europe,  and  from  the  slopes  of  the  Himalayas. 
It  was  revered  by  the  ancients :  it  is  revered  to-day 
by  the  housewife  who  inherits  and  tries  to  live  up 
to  the  traditions  of  her  mother  and  grandmothers. 
And  who  can  do  that  unless  she  has  in  her  fruit 
cellar  stores  of  quince  preserves  and  jelly?  "Mar- 
melo, "  is  the  Portuguese  name  for  the  quince;  so 
other  fruits  are  masquerading  in  borrowed  finery 
when  they  are  preserved  under  the  label,  mar- 
malade. The  peculiar  change  of  the  white  flesh 


212  THE    BOOK    OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

of  quince  to  deep  red  while  cooking  is  shared  by 
no  other  fruit  I  know. 

Quince  trees  grow  slowly,  and  attain  no  great 
size.  For  this  reason  seedling  quince  trees  are 
used  as  stocks  on  which  to  graft  apple  and 
pear  scions,  when  dwarf  trees  are  desired. 
The  slow-growing  stock  checks  the  rate  of 
growth  in  the  top,  and  induces  the  habit  of  early 
fruiting. 

From  Japan  we  have  imported  a  species  of 
quince  that  bursts  into  a  flame  of  red  blossoms 
before  the  leaves  are  fairly  out  in  spring.  It  is 
an  admirable  hedge  plant.  The  fruit  is  not  edible, 
but  is  very  fragrant,  and  is  sometimes  laid  amongst 
linen  in  bureau  drawers.  The  Chinese  wild  quince 
we  rarely  see  in  America. 

MEDLAR 

The  medlar  is  a  wild  fruit  tree  from  the  woods 
of  central  Europe.  It  is  soft-fleshed  when  ripe, 
but  is  indifferent  in  flavor,  and  is  only  occasion- 
ally grown  as  a  curiosity.  The  core  is  exposed  at 
the  blossom  end,  as  if  there  was  not  quite  enough 
flesh  to  reach  around  the  seeds.  The  only  use 
made  of  the  fruit  is  for  preserves,  or  to  nibble  at 
when  frost  has  softened  the  pulp. 


SEED-VESSELS    WE    EAT  213 

LOQUAT 

A  small,  pear-shaped  fruit,  scarcely  as  large  as 
a  plum,  with  yellow  skin  and  a  pleasantly  acid 
taste,  grows  wild  in  China  and  Japan,  and  is  called 
the  loquat.  Introduced  into  California,  it  is  com- 
mon in  the  fruit  stalls  in  Los  Angeles.  It  thrives 
in  southern  Australia,  and  is  one  of  the  common 
market  fruits  in  Sydney  and  other  towns. 

STONE    FRUITS 

Plums  and  cherries,  peaches  and  apricots  are 
stone  fruits.  The  pulpy  flesh  encloses  the  single 
seed,  which  has  a  hard  shell,  like  a  nut.  The 
trees  have  a  resinous  sap  that  flows  out  to  heal 
wounds  in  the  bark.  The  drug,  hydrocyanic  acid, 
gives  the  characteristic  bitter  taste  to  the  sap  and 
the  pits  of  the  fruit.  It  is  poisonous,  but  does  not 
affect  the  flesh.  Stone  fruits  have  been  improved 
by  cultivation  until  they  represent  one  of  the  im- 
portant fruit  groups  of  the  Temperate  Zones. 

PLUMS 

The  European  plums  have  come  from  ancestors 
that  grow  wild  in  the  Caucasus  and  Asia  Minor. 
The  woolly-twigged  varieties  we  see  in  New 
England  gardens,  and  in  better  condition  on  the 


214  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

Pacific  Slope,  the  Damsons  and  Green  Gages,  for 
two  examples,  are  from  European  nurseries, 
originally.  They  do  poorly  in  other  sections  of 
this  country. 

For  this  reason,  horticulturists  early  began  the 
improvement  of  our  own  wild  plums:  the  low 
beach  plum  of  the  Atlantic  coast,  the  Canada, 
the  Chickasaw,  the  wild  red,  and  the  sloes  of  the 
Southeast.  Each  represented  a  large  section  of 
the  country,  and  in  the  centre  the  Wild  Goose,  a 
natural  hybrid  appeared,  which  is  the  parent  of 
two  fine  groups  of  cultivated  varieties :  the  Miner 
of  northern  orchards,  and  the  Wayland  in  the 
South.  So  this  country  is  particularly  rich  in 
plums. 

Prunes  are  dried  plums.  The  varieties  suitable 
for  drying  are  sweet  and  firm-fleshed.  The  city 
of  Tours  is  the  centre  of  the  prune  district  of 
France.  California  raises  quantities  of  prunes. 

Japan  has  contributed  some  fine  new  varieties 
to  the  American  plum  orchards,  some  of  the  largest 
and  finest  being  grown  on  the  Pacific  coast  states. 

PEACHES 

First  among  the  members  of  the  stone  fruits,  by 
reason  of  size,  lusciousness  and  flavor,  stands  the 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  215 

peach,  native  of  China,  probably,  but  long  in 
cultivation  in  Europe  and  all  countries  that  touch 
the  old  highway  through  Persia  to  the  Mediter- 
ranean. The  Chinese  cultivated  it  at  a  remote 
period,  and  it  was  carried  into  Europe  three  cen- 
turies before  the  birth  of  Christ.  The  early 
colonists  brought  it  to  America;  here  it  thrives  in 
all  sections  that  have  a  mild  winter  climate. 

A  peculiarity  of  the  peach  is  that  the  pit  is  very 
rough,  while  the  pits  of  plums,  apricots,  and  cher- 
ries are  smooth.  Another  is  that  some  varieties 
are  clingstones,  others  freestones.  The  fuzzy 
skin  of  a  peach  is  thick  or  thin,  according  to  the 
variety,  red  or  yellow,  the  flesh  yellow  or  white. 
Occasionally  smooth  peaches  occur  with  furry  ones 
on  the  same  tree.  A  tree  that  has  borne  peaches 
may  produce  a  crop  of  fruits  that  are  all  smooth. 
Or  half  of  the  limbs  may  bear  one  sort,  and  the 
rest  the  other.  Indeed,  a  single  fruit  may  be  half 
furry  and  half  smooth. 

A  smooth  peach  is  called  a  nectarine.  The  seed 
of  a  nectarine  will  almost  always  produce  a  nec- 
tarine tree.  Yet  the  peach  is  counted  the  par- 
ent and  the  nectarine  a  changeling  child,  a  "sport," 
illustrating  the  fact  that  in  plants  and  animals 
there  is  no  law  so  stable  as  the  law  that  produces 
constant  variations  from  the  type.  The  offspring 


2l6  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

most  unlike  the  parent  is  often  the  one  most  able 
to  survive. 

The  English  gardener  raises  delicious  peaches 
under  glass,  and  trained  on  south  walls  where  they 
can  get  all  the  sun  possible.  The  sunnier  lands 
to  the  South  grow  the  fruit  to  greatest  perfection. 
America  has  large  orchards  of  varieties  that  are 
solid  enough  to  stand  packing  and  shipping,  as  the 
dessert  qualities  could  not  do.  The  canneries 
take  care  of  the  surplus,  so  we  get  from  market, 
fresh  and  canned,  plenty  of  this  wholesome  fruit. 
But  in  order  to  know  what  excellence  the  peach  can 
attain  to,  one  must  raise  a  few  trees  of  the  best 
French  varieties  in  a  greenhouse,  and  let  the  tree 
carry  the  fruit  until  it  is  soft  under  a  gentle 
pressure  of  the  ball  of  the  thumb. 

APRICOTS 

The  apricot  is  a  woolly  plum,  or  it  may  be  more 
accurate  to  say  that  the  plum  is  a  smooth  apricot. 
Botanists  and  horticulturists  recognize  the  close 
relationship  between  the  two  groups  of  species. 
They  both  belong  to  the  genus  Prunus.  From  the 
woods  of  Armenia  the  apricot  has  been  carried  to 
all  parts  of  the  world.  Apricots  are  in  the  markets 
of  California  and  other  warmer  states  in  Australia 


SEED-VESSELS    WE    EAT  217 

and  South  Africa.  Italian  apricots  are  among 
the  finest.  There  are  many  varieties.  Dried 
apricots  are  an  important  export  from  northern 
India  to  Thib>et  and  the  provinces  of  western 
China.  In  the  oases  of  upper  Egypt  a  variety 
with  sweet  kernels  is  raised.  Here  the  dried  flesh, 
and  the  nuts  are  both  articles  of  commerce,  and 
staple  foods  of  the  people.  The  name  of  this  fruit 
is"Musch-Musch." 

CHERRIES 

Four  wild  species  of  cherry  grow  in  the  woods  of 
America,  and  not  one  has  yet  shown  any  disposi- 
tion to  become  large  and  sweet,  like  the  cherries 
of  our  gardens  and  orchards.  We  grow  sour 
cherries  for  pies,  and  sweet  cherries  that  are 
delicious  to  eat  fresh  out  of  hand.  The  two  types 
are  distinct,  and  both  originated  in  wild  species 
that  still  grow  in  different  parts  of  Asia  Minor, 
Persia,  and  the  north  of  Africa.  It  is  strange, 
but  true  that  European  cherries  grow  well  with 
us  where  European  plums  fail,  and  our  native 
cherries  fail  to  fill  the  breach,  as  our  native  plums 
have  done. 

The  Japanese  cherries  are  highly  cultivated 
varieties,  but  the  blossom,  not  the  fruit,  has  been 


2l8  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

the  subject  of  improvement.  Many  varieties  do 
not  fruit  at  all,  but  have  blossoms  so  wonderful 
that  the  whole  nation  turns  out  to  view  the  gar- 
dens in  May,  the  cherry-blossom  month,  one  of 
the  great  national  fetes  of  the  year. 

THE    CANE    FRUITS 

Brambles,  we  call  the  long-armed  plants  of  the 
genus  Rubus,  which  cannot  hold  themselves  erect, 
but  sprawl  on  the  ground,  and  make  a  thicket 
by  sending  up  suckers  or  by  striking  root  at 
the  tips  of  the  arching  canes.  The  difficulties 
of  walking  through  or  past  such  plants  are 
increased  by  the  prickles  that  turn  their  points 
backward. 

The  raspberries  of  our  gardens  are  descendants 
of  wild  brambles  that  are  abundant  in  the  wilds 
of  North  America,  Europe,  and  Asia.  The  rough 
surface  of  the  fruit  suggested  the  name.  Black, 
white,  red,  and  yellow  varieties  are  grown.  The 
wild  "black  caps"  are  our  native  raspberries,  often 
very  fine  fruit  in  rich,  woodland  soil,  but  usually 
the  better  for  cultivation. 

Blackberries  are  a  famous  wild  fruit  in  many 
parts  of  this  country.  The  bush  blackberry  of  the 
eastern  states  has  many  cultivated  forms,  widely 


SEEDVESSELS    WE    EAT 

distributed.  The  dewberry  is  a  trailing  blackberry 
with  sweet,  large,  fine-flavored  fruit.  It  is  known 
in  several  fine  varieties. 

The  loganberry  is  a  wonderful  large  blackberry 
with  the  flavor  of  the  red  raspberry,  and  some  of 
its  color.  It  was  a  chance  hybrid,  produced  in 
1 88 1,  by  crossing  the  wild  blackberry  of  the 
Pacific  Slope  with  one  of  the  red  raspberries  cul- 
tivated in  a  California  garden.  The  new  form 
is  splendidly  vigorous  in  growth,  and  produces 
more  and  better  and  bigger  berries  than  had  been 
known  on  any  cane  fruit. 

Judge  Logan,  of  Santa  Cruz,  was  honored  for 
his  discovery.  The  loganberry  is  one  of  tfce  great 
gifts  to  horticulture.  It  is  grown  in  California 
most  abundantly,  but  has  been  established  in  the 
east,  and  other  countries  will  have  it  in  course  of 
time. 

Next  comes  "the  Wizard  of  Santa  Rosa," 
Luther  Burbank,  and  crosses  the  native  dewberry 
with  a  red  raspberry.  The  result  is  a  new  fruit 
that  outdoes  the  loganberry  in  all  its  good  points. 
It  is  called  the  Phenomenal.  The  Primus  is 
another  Burbank  triumph.  It  is  a  huge,  fine 
raspberry,  the  size  of  a  large  thimble,  but  the 
centre  is  pulpy  and  sweet.  The  parents  of  this 
fruit  are  a  blackberry  and  a  raspberry. 


220  THE  BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

THE    BUSH    FRUITS 

Currants  and  gooseberries  grow  wild  in  both 
the  Old  and  the  New  World,  and  are  cultivated 
in  a  multitude  of  improved  varieties.  These  are 
tart,  spicy  fruits,  fine  for  jelly  and  jams,  and  for 
stewing,  green  or  ripe.  The  largest  gooseberries 
are  the  size  of  plums,  and  sweet  enough  to  eat  out 
of  hand.  The  cherry  currants  are  equally  fine  as 
dessert  fruit  in  the  natural  state,  when  fully  ripe. 

We  who  have  picked  the  small,  but  sprightly, 
green  gooseberries  of  the  woods,  both  the  prickly 
and  the  smooth  ones,  know  that  no  cultivated 
form,  no  matter  how  mild  it  is,  can  excel  in  rich 
flavor  the  sauce  they  make.  It  is  worth  while 
to  grow  wild  gooseberries,  in  order  to  have  them 
spiced  for  serving  with  roast  fowl  and  game  in 
winter. 

FINE   WILD    BERRIES 

Cranberries  grow  in  boggy  land  in  various  parts 
of  North  America,  and  Europe,  and  require  to  be 
flooded  during  the  winter  time  to  keep  the  plants 
from  freezing  and  being  heaved  out  of  the  ground. 
Flooding  of  the  lower  parts  of  the  plants  during 
growing  time  is  practised;  but  with  the  approach 
of  autumn,  which  is  the  season  of  harvest,  the 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  221 

bogs  are  drained  in  order  that  the  picking  can  be 
done. 

The  oval  red  berries  are  less  than  an  inch  long, 
thin-skinned,  with  small  seeds  in  a  corky  white 
pulp.  They  look  very  pretty  on  the  branches 
of  the  evergreen  bushes  that  stand  close,  a  foot 
or  so  in  height,  and  look  like  a  level,  green  velvet 
carpett 

The  bog  is  laid  off  in  strips  by  the  stretching 
of  ropes,  and  the  pickers  gather  the  berries  by 
hand,  or  with  rake  scoops,  that  comb  them  off, 
wholesale. 

Cape  Cod  is  the  biggest  cranberry  region  in  the 
East.  Wisconsin  and  Michigan  have  large  areas 
from  which  this  crop  is  marketed. 

Huckleberries,  whortleberries,  blueberries,  and 
cranberries,  all  are  names  that  call  up  memories 
of  delightful  berrying  expeditions  into  the  wilds, 
and  delicious  tarts,  pies,  and  preserves  made  of  the 
fruit  at  home.  It  is  hard  to  believe  that  culti- 
vation can  add  to  the  value  of  these  wild  species. 
Some  attempts  have  proved  that  great  increase 
in  size  is  to  be  expected,  when  the  work  is  seriously 
taken  in  hand.  The  only  way  to  improve  them, 
we  think,  is  to  multiply  the  available  supply, 
and  bring  them  where  everybody  can  have  all 
he  wants. 


222  THE    BOOK    OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

STRAWBERRIES 

Babes  in  the  woods,  in  the  folklore  of  various 
countries,  have  eaten  wild  strawberries,  and  been 
covered  over  with  strawberry  leaves,  when  their 
rescuers  were  slow  to  find  them.  The  scarlet,  or 
Virginian  strawberry  was  transplanted  from  the 
woods  and  fields  into  the  gardens  of  the  early 
colonists.  In  the  Middle  West,  the  pioneers 
found  the  lusty,  wild  Illinois  variety.  On  the 
Pacific  Slope  two  or  three  native  kinds  grow  at 
different  elevations.  In  Europe,  the  wild  species 
are  the  wood,  or  alpine  perpetual  strawberry,  the 
hauibois,  or  musk  strawberry,  and  one  or  two 
beside.  All  these  have  been  brought  into  cultiva- 
tion centuries  back.  The  ease  of  transplanting 
or  of  raising  them  from  seed  left  no  excuse  for 
omitting  this  delightful  fruit  from  the  home  gar- 
den. 

While  the  American  horticulturist  was  strug- 
gling to  tame  the  wild  strawberry  of  the  east 
coast,  which  repaid  his  efforts  only  by  running  to 
luxurious  vines  instead  of  to  fruit,  a  wild  species, 
taken  to  England  by  travellers  in  Chili,  suddenly 
absorbed  the  attention  of  all  horticulturists.  It 
became  the  parent  of  a  remarkable  line  of  garden 
varieties,  through  crosses  with  the  wild  and  culti- 


SEED-VESSELS    WE    EAT  223 

vated  strawberries  of  Europe  and  America.  The 
garden  strawberries  of  this  country  trace  their 
ancestry  to  this  Chilean  species.  But  the  strange 
thing  about  it  is  that  we  cannot  succeed  with  the 
Chilean  plant  when  it  is  brought  from  our  west 
coast,  where  it  grows  wild.  It  must  come  by  way 
of  European  gardens. 

The  flavor  and  color  of  our  own  wild  straw- 
berries are  deserving  of  perpetuation  in  gardens. 
But  who  can  blame  the  discouraged  gardener  for 
dropping  everything  else,  and  grasping  the  new 
opportunities  that  opened  to  him  when  the  Wilson 
variety  appeared!  It  suddenly  became  possible 
for  every  garden  to  have  a  bed  of  strawberries 
with  big  clusters  of  luscious  fruit.  Until  the 
Wilson  came,  no  strawberries  were  seen  in  our 
city  markets,  and  none  were  grown  outside  the 
special  gardens  of  the  rich.  This  wonderful  dis- 
covery, that  everybody  could  have  all  he  pleased, 
came  about  1854. 

A  few  people  I  have  known  were  unable  to  eat 
strawberries.  But  it  was  not  because  they  did  not 
like  them:  they  keenly  felt  the  deprivation.  We 
all  think,  as  did  Doctor  Boteler  in  "The  Com- 
plete Angler  " :  "  Doubtless  God  could  have  made 
a  better  berry,  but  doubtless  God  never  did. " 

The  name  of  the  genus  is  Fragaria,  meaning 


224  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

fragrance,  one  of  the  delightful  qualities  of  this 
delicious  and  beautiful  fruit. 

Growing  strawberries  for  market  is  hard  and 
exacting  work,  requiring  that  the  worker  stoop 
continually  in  taking  care  of  the  plants  and  pick- 
ing the  fruit.  To  get  the  berries  to  market  in  the 
best  condition  requires  that  they  be  picked  at  just 
the  ripe  state,  and  kept  from  being  roughly  handled 
in  transit.  The  best  way  to  have  perfect  berries 
is  to  grow  them.  This  can  be  made  a  delightful 
pastime,  free  from  too  much  hard  work.  Get 
plants  of  the  best  possible  variety  and  grow  them 
to  perfection.  That  is  a  job  that  brings  its  own 
reward. 

To  enjoy  the  growing  of  strawberries  one  must 
know  the  habits  of  the  plants.  From  the  crown 
a  thick  brush  of  fibrous  roots  go  down,  and  a 
number  of  leaves  go  up.  Among  the  leaves  the 
flower  stems  rise,  and  fruit  follows  the  flowers. 
After  the  fruiting  season  passes,  the  plant  sends 
up  long  stems  that  creep  out  in  all  directions,  and 
strike  root  at  the  joints.  So  these  looping  "run- 
ners" set  out  new  plants,  wherever  they  get  hold 
of  the  soil.  The  stems  between  the  new  and 
old  plants  die,  in  time,  and  a  family  of  vigorous, 
and  independent  youngsters  surround  the  parent. 

Another  method  of  producing  new  plants   is 


SEED-VESSELS    WE    EAT  225 

scattering  seeds.  Birds  eat  the  berries,  and  the 
seeds,  scattered  abroad,  grow  the  next  summer 
into  full-sized  plants.  From  seedlings  some  of  the 
good  varieties  have  originated.  The  runners  are 
like  the  parent  plant.  The  seedling  is  likely  to 
differ,  though  some  varieties  "come  true." 

One  of  the  discouraging  facts  about  strawberry 
culture  in  the  early  stages,  fifty  years  ago,  was  the 
failure  of  a  bed  to  produce  berries,  even  though  it 
received  the  best  care  and  blossomed  profusely. 
A  study  of  the  flowers  solved  that  problem. 

The  blossom  of  a  strawberry  plant  is  like  a 
white  rose,  with  a  single  row  of  white  petals 
around  a  cone  of  pistils.  The  stamens,  many  or 
few,  are  set  on  the  petals,  and  form  a  ring  around 
the  cone. 

Sometimes  the  stamens  are  so  few  or  so  weak 
that  they  do  not  furnish  pollen  to  fertilize  the 
pistils.  This  results  in  the  withering  away  of  the 
cone.  The  cone  grows  into  the  fleshy  berry,  when 
seeds  are  set.  If  the  top  of  the  cone,  only,  fails 
of  fertilization,  that  part  withers,  and  the  berry 
fills  out  only  in  the  portion  next  to  the  calyx,  or 
hull.  Such  a  berry  is  called  a  "nubbin. " 

A  variety  that  is  unable  to  set  fruit  because  its 
flowers  produce  insufficient  amount  of  pollen  must 
be  planted  with  one  that  produces  copious  supply, 


226  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

and  blossoms  at  the  same  time.  The  wind  and 
insect  visitors  scatter  the  vitalizing  dust,  and  a 
fine  crop  results.  Experiments  have  found  out 
what  varieties  are  best  suited  to  be  planted  to- 
gether. Before  a  bed  is  set  out,  a  practical  grower 
in  the  neighborhood  should  be  consulted,  and  his 
advice  followed. 

The  way  to  get  the  best  plants,  and  the  quickest 
crop  from  them,  is  to  sink  little  pots  of  rich  earth 
under  the  best  rooting  joints  of  the  runners, 
choosing  the  parent  plants  for  their  vigor  and  the 
quality  of  their  berries.  If  started  in  July,  a  mass 
of  roots  will  fill  each  pot  before  the  end  of  August. 
These  independent  plants  may  be  set  out  in  the 
prepared  bed  in  September,  without  disturbing 
the  roots.  By  the  time  the  threat  of  frosty 
weather  requires  that  they  be  covered  with  a  pro- 
tecting mulch  they  will  be  well-grown,  and  will  set 
lusty  fruit-buds  in  the  coming  spring.  Some 
amateurs  tear  up  the  bed  after  this  first  crop  is 
picked.  Others  think  the  second  crop  the  best 
from  pot-grown,  fall-set  plants. 

PINEAPPLES 

Once  an  irate  commission  merchant  in  a  north- 
ern city  wrote  a  letter  to  a  pineapple  grower  in 


SEED-VESSELS    WE    EAT  227 

southern  Florida,  charging  him  with  sending 
second-rate  fruit.  The  consignment  contained 
many  imperfect  specimens.  He  threatened  dire 
consequences  if  any  more  "windfall  pineapples" 
came  his  way!  The  south  half  of  Florida  still 
laughs,  though  the  joke  is  old. 

The  largest  pineapple  orchard  in  the  United 
States  is  near  Fort  Myers  on  the  West  Coast. 
This  tropical  fruit  is  sensitive  to  cold  and  dry  air. 
It  grows  only  in  the  lower  part  of  Florida.  Even 
southern  California  has  given  up  the  attempt  to 
raise  it. 

A  field  of  pineapples  ready  to  harvest  does  not 
look  like  an  orchard.  The  plants  grow  in  rows  and 
hills,  like  corn,  and  each  bears  its  one  fruit  on  the 
stout  central  stalk,  about  a  foot  above  the  ground. 
Around  it  arch  the  long,  thickened,  sword-like 
leaves,  very  prickly  on  the  edges,  and  at  the  tip. 
It  would  be  a  hurricane,  indeed,  that  produced 
any  windfalls  of  this  crop. 

The  negroes  that  gather  the  "pines"  wrap  their 
legs  up  to  the  knees  with  the  thickest  cloth  they 
can  find.  Strips  of  carpet  are  best.  Then  they 
put  on  mittens  or  gloves  made  of  thick  canvas, 
and  go  into  the  field  with  short,  hooked  knives,. 
and  gunny  sacks  slung  across  the  shoulder,  and 
.hanging  open  under  one  arm.  Grasping  the  spiny 


228  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

leaves  at  the  top  of  the  fruit,  the  harvester  cuts 
off  the  stem  at  its  base,  and  "chucks"  the  pine  into 
his  bag.  The  saw-like  leaves  scratch  viciously 
at  him  as  he  passes  on  to  cut  the  next  ripe 
cone,  and  when  he  goes  to  empty  his  bag  into 
the  crates,  distributed  from  wagons  through  the 
field. 

Often  I  have  seen  the  picker  toss  the  fruits,  as 
he  picks  them,  to  a  man  outside  the  rows,  who 
catches  them  skilfully,  and  lays  them  uninjured 
in  the  crates.  From  the  field,  the  filled  crates  go  to 
the  packing  sheds,  where  each  sound  pine  is  put 
into  a  paper  bag  about  its  size,  and  closely  packed 
in  crates  that  are  loaded  onto  cars  or  into  vessels 
bound  for  distant  cities.  The  processes  are  very 
simple,  and  the  solid  fruit  ripens  in  transit.  . 

New  plantations  are  set  with  suckers,  or  offsets, 
that  spring  out  around  the  base  of  the  pineapple, 
or  the  stalk  below  it.  The  wild  plant  has  seeds, 
but  cultivation  has  discouraged  seed-production. 
The  seed-vessels  become  the  fleshy  substance 
behind  the  "eyes."  In  the  best  varieties,  even 
the  core  is  soft  and  luscious. 

There  is  no  more  refreshing  fruit  in  the  world 
than  ripe  pineapples.  But  we  must  eat  them  in 
the  field,  or  at  least  close  to  the  place  in  which  they 
are  grown,  because  fully  ripe  ones  are  not  able  to 


'SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  229 

travel;  and  those  that  are  cut  when  less  than  ripe 
never  attain  perfection. 

The  native  Floridian  sits  down  to  rest,  and  cuts 
the  rough  outside  off  of  a  big  "sugar  loaf,"  as  a 
Yankee  would  peel  an  apple.  Then  he  slices  it 
across  the  bottom,  and  eats  the  slices,  holding  the 
uncut  fruit  by  the  leafy  top.  Does  he  eat  a  whole 
one?-  Bless  you,  he  has  only  started  in!  One, 
two,  or  three  are  not  too  many  to  quench  the  thirst 
of  a  man.  The  Northerner  gasps  to  see  fruit  that 
at  home  would  cost  over  a  dollar  disappearing 
down  the  throat  of  a  loafer  who  has  jogged  out 
from  town  to  see  how  the  harvest  is  coming  on. 
Nobody  chides  him  for  coming. 

Quantities  of  pines  go  north  from  the  West 
Indies,  whose  climate  produces  fine  fruit.  Brazil, 
the  native  place  of  the  wild  pineapple,  raises  a  con- 
siderable supply  for  export.  The  cultivation  of 
the  fruit  has  spread  to  the  Tropics  of  Africa  and 
Asia.  For  a  long  time  English  gardeners  have 
raised  the  finest  kinds  of  this  fruit  in  special  hot- 
houses built  for  the  purpose. 

The  leaves  of  pineapple  plants  contain  valuable 
fibre.  We  see  it  in  the  wonderful  pina-cloth,  im- 
ported from  the  Philippines.  The  natives  of  the 
Islands  of  the  Malay  Archipelago  also  strip  and 
wash  out  the  fibre,  using  primitive  comb-like  tools 


230  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

of  bamboo,  and  taking  infinite  pains.  The 
attempts  to  invent  a  machine  for  getting  out  the 
fibre  cheaply  have  failed,  so  far,  in  this  country. 
So  the  leaves  are  cleared  off  and  destroyed,  at 
some  expense  and  great  inconvenience,  to  get 
ready  for  the  next  year's  crop. 

FIGS 

The  rich,  sugary,  amber  figs  that  lie  packed 
tightly  together  in  boxes  shipped  from  faraway 
Smyrna,  in  Asia  Minor,  should  form  a  part  of 
every  child's  Christmas.  They  are  a  delicious 
and  wholesome  sweet,  both  food  and  candy. 
Americans  use  them  increasingly  in  desserts  and 
cakes.  Tons  are  imported  every  year  from  the 
warm  countries  to  the  east  of  the  Mediterranean 
Sea  —  from  Turkey  in  Europe  and  in  Asia. 

Why  not  grow  our  own  figs?  That  question 
has  been  asked  by  people  who  see  fig  trees  growing 
luxuriantly  in  various  regions  of  the  United  States. 
Anybody  who  takes  the  trouble  can  raise  fig  trees 
from  seed,  and  the  trees  are  hardy  as  far  north  as 
Philadelphia. 

They  grow  thriftily  and  fruit  abundantly  in  the 
warm  states.  One,  two,  and  three  crops  a  year, 
almost  without  attention  —  white  figs,  black  figs, 


SEED-VESSELS    WE    EAT  23 1 

purple,  and  golden  —  the  trees  produce.  Splendid 
fruit  for  eating  green  or  ripe,  for  preserves,  for 
fattening  hogs.  But  for  drying,  for  taking  the 
place  in  commerce  of  the  Smyrna  fig,  practically 
worthless.  Here  was  the  rub. 

Trials  without  number  were  made  with  seeds 
of  this  imported  fig.  Time  and  again  cuttings 
were  brought  from  Smyrna  and  planted  in  Cali- 
fornia and  in  the  South.  Some  of  them  grew 
and  set  fruit,  but  invariably  it  dropped  before 
maturity. 

Now  we  shall  have  to  stop,  as  the  fig-growers 
did,  and  study  the  peculiarities  of  the  fig  tree, 
which  in  many  of  its  ways  will  surprise  us.  The 
scientist  came  to  the  rescue  of  the  fruit-growers, 
and  the  result  is  that  the  best  Smyrna  figs  on  the 
market  to-day  are  home-grown.  But  the  industry 
was  not  born  until  the  puzzling  problem  was  solved 
by  experts  in  the  United  States  Department  of 
Agriculture.  This  happened  in  1899. 

There  is  a  general  idea  that  fig  trees  do  not 
blossom.  Yet  the  fruit  is  full  of  seeds,  and  seeds 
follow  flowers.  You  will  see  little  green  figs 
coming  out  between  the  leaf-stem  and  the  twig, 
just  where  buds  appear  on  other  trees  in  late  sum- 
mer. These  fat  little  buds  never  open;  they  just 
grow  until  they  reach  the  size  of  a  hen's  egg,  then 


232  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

soften  and  turn  brown  or  reddish,  or  the  green 
merely  fades  out. 

To  find  the  fig  blossoms,  one  must  cut  open  the 
green  body  of  the  fruit.  There  they  are,  hundreds 
of  tiny  flowers  that  stand  close  as  the  disk  flowers 
on  a  head  of  sunflower  or  dandelion.  Draw 
together  the  edges  of  a  sunflower  disk,  and  you 
make  a  bag,  with  the  flowers  lining  it.  The  fig  is 
like  that:  the  fleshy  receptacle  forms  the  wall  of 
the  sac.  One  little  opening  leads  from  the  outside 
world.  A  small  dimple  in  the  end  opposite  the 
stem  shows  you  this  door.  -  'It  is  important  that 
you  see  it. 

Under  each  little  flower  is  a  seed.  Break  open 
a  ripe  fig,  and  the  seeds  are  thick,  under  the 
pointed  remnants  of  the  many  flowers.  Mul- 
berries and  figs  are  closely  related.  The  mulberry 
in  flower  has  its  receptacle  covered  with  crowded, 
tiny  flowers,  each  of  which  produces  a  soft  berry, 
that  is  one  of  the  many  crowded  together  in  a 
single  mulberry  fruit  an  inch  long.  If  we  can 
imagine  a  mulberry  with  its  tiny  berries  on  the 
inside  it  would  be  made  like  a  fig.  A  fig  turned 
inside  out  would  be  changed  to  the  mulberry 
pattern.  The  likeness  of  the  two  is  in  having 
many  flowers  attached  to  the  surface  of  a  fleshy 
base.  No  matter  what  shape  this  base  takes 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  233 

in  growing.  It  is  the  part  that  is  sweet  and 
edible. 

Now,  the  setting  of  seed  depends  upon  the 
pollenating  of  the  flowers.  Some  are  self-pollen- 
ated.  Some  require  cross-pollenating  by  wind  or 
by  insect  assistance.  The  Smyrna  fig  is  one  that 
cannot  set  fruit  by  itself.  That  is  why  the  little 
fruits  fall.  No  use  to  form  fruits  with  no  seeds 
in  them.  So  the  imported  trees  seem  to  think. 

In  the  orchards  of  Turkey,  wild  figs,  the  Capri 
species,  with  plenty  of  pollen,  but  worthless  fruit, 
are  planted.  So  the  investigators  from  America 
sent  the  wild  species  over  to  plant  in  California 
fig  orchards,  thinking  that  this  would  solve  the 
difficulty.  They  also  sent  word  that  the  Smyrna 
growers  cut  off  the  wild  figs  and  hung  them  in  the 
trees  of  the  cultivated  sorts,  to  make  the  setting 
of  fruit  sure.  This  was  done  in  America.  But 
the  small  figs  kept  on  dropping. 

Is  the  pollen  ripe  just  when  the  flowers  are 
ready  to  be  fertilized?  How  in  the  world  does  it 
get  in  through  the  narrow  door  of  the  fruit? 
How  does  it  get  scattered  inside,  so  that  hun- 
dreds of  stigmas  receive  it?  These  questions  put 
the  scientist  on  the  right  track.  He  set  a  watch 
upon  the  Capri  fig  trees  and  the  Smyrna  trees  in 
their  own  country. 


234  THE    BOOK    OF    USEFUL   PLANTS 

Meanwhile,  Mr.  Roeding,  up  in  his  orchard  in 
Fresno  County,  California,  was  able  to  get  the 
answer:  "Yes!"  to  the  first  question.  He  took 
pollen  from  the  Capri  figs  and  forced  it  into  the 
Smyrnas'  doorways,  tagged  the  fruits  thus  treated, 
and  waited  for  results.  The  tree  dropped  all  the 
fruit  but  the  ones  that  received  the  pollen  he 
administered  by  hand.  They  swelled  to  full  size, 
ripened,  and  had  the  fragrance,  the  flavor,  and  the 
sweetness  of  the  Smyrna  figs  at  home! 

This  was  in  1890.  The  missing  link  was  now 
sought  with  all  diligence,  and  found  in  the  orchards 
of  Turkey.  A  tiny  wasp,  so  small  as  to  be  almost 
invisible  to  the  naked  eye,  was  seen  to  enter  the 
"eye"  of  the  Capri  fig,  and  the  same  insect  was 
found  in  the  other  figs  at  blossoming  time.  The 
magnifier  discovered  this  hungry  wasp  searching 
each  individual  flower  for  its  sac  of  nectar.  Once 
identified,  it  was  easy  to  recognize  the  fact  that 
these  midge-like  insects  were  not  at  all  scarce. 
The  industry  of  fig-culture  depended  upon  them! 
Without  them,  the  whole  world  would  go  fig- 
hungry. 

How  startled  the  nectar-loving  little  Blasto- 
phaga  would  have  been  to  learn  what  a  grave 
responsibility  rested  upon  her  —  meso-thorax! 
(Insects  do  not  have  shoulders.)  Is  an  insect  ever 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  235 

conscious  of  the  fact  that  it  carries  pollen  from 
flower  to  flower?  Never!  She  cannot  avoid 
smearing  her  legs  and  body  with  sticky  nectar,  and 
dragging  over  tjie  powdery  stamens  and  the  waxy 
stigmas,  all  ready  for  the  vitalizing  dust  that  en- 
ables them  to  set  seed.  But  the  insect  is  all  uncon- 
scious of  doing  a  work  for  the  flowers,  or  the  tree. 
She  is  selfishly  gathering  stolen  sweets.  Her  own 
well-being  and  that  of  her  growing  family  are  her 
sole  aim. 

Turkey  in  Asia  and  California  are  many  days' 
journey  apart.  Often  captured  Blastophagas 
were  shipped  to  America,  but  they  died  on  the 
way.  I  suppose  it  is  hard  to  give  sufficient  air  in 
a  package  that  contains  insects  small  enough  to  go 
easily  through  the  meshes  of  ordinary  cheesecloth ! 
It  is  hard  to  supply  them  with  proper  lunch  for 
two  or  three  weeks.  But  the  difficult  undertaking 
at  last  succeeded.  And  the  immigrant  wasps  took 
up  their  abode  in  the  Capri  figs,  and  made  them- 
selves at  home  in  the  sunny  climate  of  California. 
The  year  1899  saw  our  first  crop  of  Smyrna  figs 
ripen  on  the  trees,  as  the  result  of  the  bringing  in 
of  the  Asiatic  wasp  that  fertilizes  the  flowers. 

The  grower  "caprifies"  his  trees  by  hanging 
fruits  of  the  wild  Capri  fig  in  the  branches  of  the 
orchard  trees,  and  thus  making  the  distance  short 


236  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

that  the  insects  have  to  go  for  their  nectar 
supply.  Of  course  it  is  imperative  that  the  wild 
species  be  planted  near  by.  Only  a  few  are 
needed  to  supply  many  of  the  fruiting  kinds  with 
pollen. 

Now  the  nurserymen  who  supply  young  trees 
for  an  orchard  of  figs  send  the  necessary  number 
of  wild  ones,  and  when  the  time  of  fruiting  arrives, 
(and  that  is  within  three  or  four  years  of  the  setting 
of  the  trees)  he  sends  a  supply  of  the  wasps 
to  get  them  established  in  the  orchards.  Usually 
after  the  first  supplies  are  received,  the  grower 
pays  no  more  attention  to  the  means  by  which  his 
fruit  is  set.  Nature  has  established  an  automatic 
system  of  reciprocity  between  the  insect  and  the 
tree,  and  the  owner  has  only  to  gather  his  figs  and 
market  them. 

The  giant  fig  trees  of  California  are  the  wonder 
of  the  visitor,  used  to  the  comparatively  small 
orange  and  other  orchard  trees  he  has  seen.  One 
veteran,  planted  in  1856  on  the  Rancho  Chico, 
spreads  150  feet,  and  its  branches,  by  striking  root, 
form  pillars,  like  the  banyan-tree  of  India.  This 
reminds  us  that  the  fig  and  the  banyan-tree  and 
the  India-rubber  tree  are  first  cousins  —  members 
of  the  same  genus,  Ficus.  The  sticky,  milky 
juice  of  the  fig,  that  gets  on  your  fingers  when  you 


SEED-VESSELS    WE    EAT  237 

pull  a  ripe  one  from  the  tree,  is  not  unlike  the 
milky  latex  which  hardens  into  rubber. 

BANANAS 

Thirty  years  ago  few  people  outside  the  large 
cities  had  ever  seen  a  banana — fewer  by  far  were 
those  who  knew  and  liked  the  taste  of  the  fruit. 
Surprising  changes  have  been  brought  about  by 
the  growth  of  commerce  between  this  country  and 
the  West  Indies.  The  poorest  family  in  the  small- 
est inland  village  can  afford  to  eat  this  tropical 
fruit,  for  it  is  everywhere,  and  usually  it  is  the 
cheapest  to  be  had. 

To  see  banana  plants  growing  we  may  have  to 
go  no  farther  than  the  city  park,  even  if  we  live 
in  the  region  of  cold  winters.  Started  in  green- 
houses, they  make  an  interesting  tropical  feature 
of  the  mass-planting  in  the  border,  or  the  high 
centre  of  a  round  flower  bed.  Such  plants  remind 
one  of  huge  corn  stalks,  though  the  leaves  are 
broad  sheets  of  green  that  are  soon  slit  into  strings 
down  to  the  strong  midrib  by  flapping  in  the  wind. 

In  the  southern  states  the  season  is  so  long  that 
these  plants  blossom.  The  single  huge  bud  turns 
down,  and  begins  blossoming  by  lifting  the  purple 
bract  that  sheathes  the  oldest  and  uppermost 


238  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

group  of  flowers.  Gradually  the  sheath  drops, 
the  showy  stamens  fall  away,  and  finger-like  green 
fruits  in  the  familiar  "hand"  of  eight  to  fifteen 
bananas  are  seen.  How  near  these  come  to  ripen- 
ing depends  upon  the  latitude  and  the  season. 

Warmth  and  sun  are  supplied  in  a  narrow  belt 
that  crosses  southern  Florida.  This  is  the  north- 
ern rim  of  the  "banana  belt"  that  covers  the  West 
Indies  and  Central  America,  and  on  around  the 
globe.  Southern  Louisiana,  Texas,  Mexico,  and 
southern  California  have  paying  banana  planta- 
tions within  a  narrow  area. 

The  banana  stalk  grows  in  the  Tropics  to  a 
height  of  thirty  feet.  This  is  its  maximum,  of 
course.  In  ordinary  plantations  no  such  giants 
are  seen.  Fancy  harvesting  the  single  clusters  of 
fruit  from  such  stalks!  The  rootstocks  under- 
ground live  on,  sending  up  new  shoots,  which 
reach  maturity  and  fruit  within  a  year  or  eighteen 
months  from  the  time  they  start.  Immediately 
after  fruiting  the  stalk  dies.  The  planter's  job  is 
to  cut  out  these  stalks  as  fast  as  he  harvests  the 
fruit  clusters. 

The  fruit  is  cut  green  but  full-grown,  and  put 
directly  into  the  hold  of  vessels  that  sail  without 
delay  for  northern  cities.  The  jobbers  have  cars 
in  waiting  to  distribute  the  cargo  to  inland  points. 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  239 

So,  with  the  least  possible  delay  and  handling,  the 
crop  moves  to  the  consumer.  Cold  storage  is  not 
for  bananas.  But  in  the  cool  atmosphere  that 
suits  them  they,  gradually  ripen,  and  hung  in  the 
grocer's  windows,  turn  from  green  to  yellow. 

The  big  yellow  Martinique  is  the  most  common 
variety  we  have.  The  crimson  fruit  of  the  Red 
Jamaica  is  occasionally  shipped  in,  and  is  used  in 
making  up  baskets  of  fancy  fruits.  We  rarely  see 
the  kind  called  plantain,  that  is  not  sweet,  but  is 
cooked  as  a  vegetable  in  all  tropical  countries.  The 
fruit  of  one  of  these  coarse  plantains  in  East 
Africa  is  about  the  size  and  shape  of  a  man's  arm! 

A  traveller  in  the  Far  East  describes  the  great 
golden  bunches  of  bananas  heaped  by  the  tons  in 
the  market  places  of  cities  of  Java,  and  cheap 
beyond  belief.  "The  Java  pisang,  or  banana, 
however,  is  but  a  coarse  plantain  with  pinkish- 
yellow,  dry  pulp,  of  a  pumpkiny  flavor  that  sadly 
disappoints  the  palate.  Yet  it  is  Nature's  greatest 
gift  in  the  tropics.  Every  tiny  village  and  almost 
every  little  native  hut  has  its  banana  patch  or  its 
banana  tree,  which  requires  nothing  of  labor  in 
cultivation,  save  the  weeding  away  of  the  old 
stalks.  Four  thousand  pounds  of  this  food  will 
grow,  without  human  aid,  within  the  same  space 
of  ground  required  to  raise  ninety-nine  pounds  of 


240  THE    BOOK    OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

potatoes  or  thirty-three  pounds  of  wheat;  both 
of  these  northern  crops  acquired,  too,  only  by 
incessant  sweat  of  the  brow  and  muscular  exertion. 
The  pisang  is  the  tropical  staff  of  life  for  white  as 
well  as  natives,  as  wholesome  and  necessary  as 
bread,  and  an  equivalent  of  the  latter  as  a  starchy 
food.  It  comes  to  one  with  the  earliest  breakfast 
cup,  appears  at  every  meal,  arrives  with  the  after- 
noon tea  tray,  and  always  ends  the  late  dinner  as 
the  inevitable  accompaniment  of  cheese. " 

The  popularity  of  our  yellow  banana  is  partly 
due  to  the  very  convenient  package  it  comes  in, 
and  to  the  fact  that  it  is  not  sticky  nor  messy, 
nor  does  it  need  "fixing"  before  children  can  eat 
it.  The  tough  skin  keeps  the  soft  inside  clean, 
yet  it  parts  easily  enough.  The  seeds  have  been 
dwarfed  to  mere  remnants  by  generations  of  repro- 
duction by  suckers. 

Banana  meal,  made  of  the  dried  flesh  of  ripe  or 
green  fruit,  and  evaporated  slices  are  on  the  mar- 
ket. In  this  form  we  may  know  what  the  fruit 
tastes  like  when  it  is  not  cut  green.  New  recipes 
for  cooking  bananas  give  us  added  pleasure  in  this 
nutritious  food.  It  has  come  to  be  ranked  one  of 
the  good  salad  fruits,  when  used  before  it  is  dead 
ripe.  It  is  served  with  Mayonnaise  or  French 
dressing,  alone  or  with  nut  meats. 


SEED-VESSELS    WE    EAT  24! 

Two  members  of  the  banana  group  have  in- 
edible fruit,  but  are  useful  for  the  fibre  they  yield. 
Manila  hemp  is  obtained  from  the  leaf  sheaths  of 
the  most  important  species.  The  leaf  blades  of 
others  are  tough  enough  for  papers.  Coarser 
ones  are  split  and  the  dried  strips  woven  into 
baskets,  mats,  and  bags. 

Starch  is  made  from  the  fleshy  rootstocks  of  an 
African  banana. 

MELONS 

The  family  of  the  cucurbits  includes  both 
vegetables  and  fruits.  Here  the  squashes,  pump- 
kins, and  cucumbers  hobnob  with  the  watermelons 
and  canteloupes.  All  are  fleshy  seed-vessels, 
with  abundant  seeds,  attached  along  three  distinct 
areas  of  the  wall  of  the  cavity  of  hollow  kinds, 
and  similarly  located  when  the  flesh  embeds  the 
seeds.  The  name,  pepo,  is  given  by  botanists 
to  all  such  fruits. 

The  watermelon  grows  wild  in  the  hottest 
regions  of  Africa.  Livingstone  described  the 
vines  as  covering  vast  areas,  and  the  natives  feast- 
ing on  the  abundant  fruit,  which,  though  small, 
was  not  bitter.  Size,  sweetness,  and  flavor  have 
all  been  added  by  cultivation.  Egypt  first  begun 
the  improvement  of  the  wild  watermelon,  and 
thence  it  has  spread  through  all  sunny,  warm 


242  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

regions  of  the  earth.  It  is  able  to  thrive  in  semi- 
desert  regions,  furnishing  a  thirst-quenching  fruit 
in  summer  where  other  fruits  are  scarce,  and  water 
a  luxury. 

Watermelon  culture  in  the  United  States  is  a 
great  commercial  enterprise  in  Georgia,  and 
neighboring  states,  which  ship  their  crops  to 
northern  markets,  and  grow  all  they  can  eat  at 
home.  The  negro's  natural  affinity  for  "de  wata- 
million  smilin'  on  de  vine  "  is  not  hard  to  explain. 
And  his  proclivities  in  the  direction  of  raiding  a 
patch  by  the  light  of  the  moon  have  been  developed 
against  his  will  and  disposition.  Much  rather 
would  he  help  himself  by  day  to  the  fruits  that  lie 
there,  just  as  in  the  equatorial  belt  of  the  dark 
continent  they  lay  to  tempt  the  thirsty  to  take  and 
eat.  Why  is  Nature's  plain  invitation  to-day 
hedged  about  by  restrictions  ?  Private  ownership 
makes  all  the  trouble,  and  puts  the  taking  of  a 
melon  on  the  list  of  misdemeanors,  if  not  crimes. 
In  spite  of  this,  the  people  of  the  sunny  South, 
black  as  well  as  white,  have  little  to  pay,  in  money 
or  in  labor,  for  all  the  watermelons  they  can  eat 
through  the  long  season.  What's  more,  they-  get 
the  best,  because  the  sweetest,  thinnest-rinded, 
best-flavored  melons  do  not  bear  shipping. 

Northern  gardens  have  a  short-growing  season, 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  243 

but  there  are  quick-growing  varieties  of  water- 
melons suited  to  their  needs.  By  starting  the 
seeds  in  flower  pots,  or  berry  baskets,  or  planting 
them  in  inverted  sods,  the  young  plants  are  well 
along  when  the  time  comes  to  set  them  in  the 
garden.  A  great  saving  of  time  is  thus  achieved. 
Liquid  manure  or  other  quick  fertilizer  forces 
growth,  and  good  culture  does  the  rest.  The  best 
soil  is  a  light,  warm,  sandy  loam. 

White-fleshed  melons  may  be  sweet  and  fine- 
flavored,  so  may  the  yellow-fleshed  varieties. 
But  the  American  taste  prefers  a  red-fleshed  water- 
melon, with  black  seeds,  and  not  too  many  of  them 
—  all  in  a  thin,  but  strong,  protecting  rind,  pre- 
ferably dark  green. 

California  is  a  great  state  for  watermelons, 
because  of  the  intense  heat  of  some  interior  valleys, 
and  the  warm  climate  of  all  the  lower  half  of  the 
state.  The  earliest  crop  comes  to  market  from 
inland  in  June.  July  and  August  have  the 
heaviest  yield.  An  acre  produces,  on  an  average, 
a  carload  of  marketable  melons.  This  means  one 
hundred  dozen.  They  run  up  to  one  hundred 
pounds  and  over;  a  twenty-pound  melon  is  con- 
sidered the  smallest  size  to  sell.  Smaller  ones 
would  grade  the  whole  lot  to  their  level,  and  that 
doesn't  pay. 


244      THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

The  record  in  size  is  held  by  a  Georgia  melon 
weighing  134  pounds.  California  boasts  the  next 
one,  which  weighed  131!  pounds. 

A  hard-fleshed,  globular  watermelon  with  little 
sweetness  is  the  so-called  "citron,"  whose  thick 
flesh  is  used  for  making  sweet  pickles  and  other 
preserves.  It  has  no  relation  to  the  true  citron 
we  get  in  candied  form.  That  is  a  near  relative  of 
the  orange. 

The  muskmelon,  or  canteloupe,  grows  wild  on 
the  coasts  of  Guinea,  in  Central  Africa,  and  in 
southwestern  Asia.  The  fruit  is  tasteless,  and 
does  not  exceed  the  average  lemon  in  size.  Who 
could  see  and  taste  that  unpromising  pepo,  and 
dream  of  a  Rocky  Ford  or  an  Emerald  Gem! 

Every  country  with  a  hot  climate,  and  light, 
but  rich,  sandy  loam  can  grow  this  most  delicious 
of  garden  products  with  little  trouble.  Northern 
states  have  a  short  season,  but  they  grow  the  best 
melons  and  most  of  them.  New  Jersey  produces 
one  half  of  the  crop  grown  in  the  United  States. 
It  supplies  the  great  cities  of  the  North  Atlantic 
coast. 

The  two  types  of  muskmelons  grown  in  this 
country  are  the  early,  short-seasoned,  nutmeg 
melons  (with  a  soft,  netted  rind),  and  the  long- 
seasoned,  hard-rinded,  and  furrowed  canteloupe, 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  245 

proper.  The  names  are  often  used  interchange- 
ably. In  California,  which  produces  fine  melons 
for  home  and  eastern  markets  from  May  to 
December,  the ,  term  "canteloupe"  is  the  one  in 
use  for  all  varieties. 

The  most  famous  variety  in  the  United  States, 
east 'and  west,  is  the  Rocky  Ford,  named  for  a 
town  in  Colorado,  the  centre  of  the  district  which 
produced  and  distributed  this  unequalled  strain 
of  the  old  "Netted  Gem."  Something  in  the  soil 
and  situation  of  these  Colorado  melon  fields 
especially  fits  them  to  grow  the  sweetest,  richest 
melons  yet  placed  on  the  market.  The  flesh  is 
thick  and  green,  and  finely  netted  outside.  One 
and  a  half  pounds  is  the  average  size.  This 
variety  exceeds  others  in  yield  of  marketable 
fruit  in  the  wonderfully  productive  melon  fields 
of  Colorado  and  California. 

Michigan  has  a  favorite  strain  of  the  same  old 
variety.  The  Osage  supplies  near  and  distant 
markets  in  the  central  northern  states.  The 
Montreal  Market,  a  Canadian  strain,  is  a  favorite 
in  the  Northeast,  and  is  grown  even  in  California. 

The  Cassaba,  or  pineapple  canteloupe,  is  a 
large,  smooth-skinned,  furrowed  melon,  with  rich, 
creamy  flesh,  flavored  somewhat  like  a  pineapple. 
The  chief  distinction  of  this  variety,  and  the  sub- 


246  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

varieties  derived  from  it  in  the  past  few  years,  is 
that  its  season  is  late,  and  it  bears  after  other 
melon  crops  are  gone.  The  ripe  fruit  is  stored 
for  months  and  keeps  well  in  transportation  to 
eastern  markets  for  the  holiday  trade. 

In  Persia  and  Turkestan,  and  all  Mediterranean 
countries,  north  and  south,  melons  have  from  the 
earliest  times  been  a  staple  article  of  food  for  all 
classes  of  people.  The  improvement  of  the  culti- 
vated varieties  has  produced  far  more  forms  than 
we  know  in  American  gardens  and  markets.  The 
French  horticulturists  have  led  in  the  work  of  im- 
provement, and  French  gardeners  excel  in  the 
production  of  dessert  qualities,  in  hothouses, 
melon-pits,  and  in  the  field.  England  has  too  cool 
a  climate  for  outdoor  melon  culture,  but  raises 
choice  varieties  to  perfection  under  glass. 

SQUASHES   AND    PUMPKINS 

Professor  Bailey,  in  his  "Lessons  with  Plants," 
tells  us  how  to  distinguish  a  pumpkin  from  a 
squash  at  a  glance.  Look  at  the  stem.  Does  it 
flare  at  the  point  where  it  joins  the  fruit?  Is  it 
a  ridged  and  furrowed  stem?  Then  the  fruit  it 
bears  is  a  pumpkin.  Is  the  stem  soft,  spongy,  and 
cylindrical,  not  enlarged  at  the  junction  with  the 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  247 

fruit?  These  are  the  characteristics  of  the  stem 
of  a  squash.  Such  stems  have  the  Hubbard  and 
turban  varieties.  The  large  cheese  pumpkin, 
Japanese  pumpkins,  and  the  cushaws  show  this 
flare.  But  the  sweet,  summer  pumpkin  does  not. 
Its  hard,  ridged  stem  is  the  tell-tale  pumpkin 
trademark. 

The-  only  disconcerting  feature  of  this  con- 
venient classification  is  the  fact  that  the  crook- 
neck  and  patty-pan  squashes  line  up  among 
the  pumpkins,  and  the  big  Chili  pumpkins  are 
squashes! 

So  when  we  make  a  pumpkin  pie  it  may  turn 
out  to  be  a  squash  pie,  judged  by  strictly  botanical 
standards.  By  any  name  it  is  good  enough  for 
hungry  Americans  in  the  middle  of  a  hard  day's 
work,  corn-husking  in  the  fall  of  the  year.  On 
the  Thanksgiving  dinner  table  no  distinction  is 
made  between  pumpkin  and  squash  pie. 

But  the  botanist  has  the  best  of  the  argument 
at  last,  because  the  group  he  calls  pumpkins  may 
be  planted  alongside  of  squashes  and  they  will 
not  intercross,  as  do  the  varieties  within  the  two 
groups. 

"Gourd"  is  the  European  name  for  all  the  pepo 
fruits.  "Pumpkin"  is  the  name  given  to  the  huge 
varieties.  The  English  "marrows"  we  know  as 


248  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

summer  squashes,  the  soft-fleshed,  delicately  flav- 
ored members  of  the  group. 

In  California  all  kinds  of  squashes  and  pumpkins 
grow  to  large  size.  Single  specimens  have  been 
exhibited  that  weighed  over  300  pounds,  and 
accredited  yields  have  gone  above  thirty  tons  to 
the  acre  in  an  ordinary  season.  Fifty  feet  of 
vine  and  a  wagonload  of  fruit  will  be  the  yield  of 
a  well-tilled  vine. 

Professor  Wickson,  dean  of  the  State  College 
of  Agriculture,  has  published  the  following  report 
received  from  a  farmer  in  Santa  Barbara  County, 
and  thereby  he  vouches  for  the  truth  of  the 
story : 

"1  planted  my  squashes  in  May,  and  harvested 
them  in  October.  Finding  that  they  were  un- 
usually large,  I  weighed  ten  of  the  largest  and 
found  that  their  aggregate  weight  was  one  ton 
and  fifty  odd  pounds,  the  largest  weighing  225 
pounds.  This  squash  was  exhibited  at  the  county 
fair,  and  received  the  first  prize. 

On  the  fifteenth  of  October,  which  was  my  boy's 
sixteenth  birthday,  I  cut  open  one  of  the  other 
squashes  that  weighed  210  pounds,  and  took  out 
the  seeds.  My  boy  then  got  into  it,  and  I  put  the 
piece  in  place,  completely  closing  him  in.  I  then 
persuaded  my  eighteen-year-old  daughter  to  get 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  249 

into  it,  and  1  closed  her  in,  in  the  same  manner. 
My  daughter's  weight  was  1 10  pounds. 

I  next  put  my  two  seven-year-old  boys  in  at 
once.  I  then  put  my  three  little  girls  in  at  once; 
they  were  aged  respectively  six,  four,  and  two 
years,  their  united  weight  being  116  pounds.  I 
placed  the  largest  child  in  the  bottom  and  the 
little  ones  on  top,  and  then  put  on  the  lid.  The 
squash  was  three  feet  four  inches  in  length. " 

The  seeds  of  all  the  melon  tribe  contain  consider- 
able nutritious  substance,  but  we  must  go  to  a  far 
country  before  we  find  them  used  as  human  food. 
The  Chinese  dote  upon  them,  as  we  do  upon  pea- 
nuts and  salted  almonds.  In  a  Chinese  theatre 
the  stranger  is  soon  conscious  of  a  murmur  made 
of  little,  crackling  sounds.  It  is  the  snapping  and 
crunching  of  dry  melon  seeds  by  the  men  and  boys 
in  the  pit,  whose  pockets  bulge  with  them.  They 
would  not  enjoy  the  play  without  these  seeds  to 
nibble,  as  they  watch  events  on  the  stage. 

OLIVES 

The  pale  green  leaves  and  the  gray  bark  of  the 
olive  trees  blend  with  the  ashy  soil  that  lies  on  the 
slopes  of  Vesuvius  and  JEtna.  It  is  amazing  that 
people  have  courage  to  plant  again  the  groves  that 


250  THE    BOOK4  OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

an  eruption  of  the  smouldering  volcano  may  at 
any  moment  destroy.  It  is  a  wonderful  tree  that 
will  grow  in  soil  made  chiefly  of  ashes.  The  olive 
does  this,  and  grows  to  huge  size  and  astonishing 
age,  if  the  fates  permit. 

Native  of  Asia  Minor,  the  olive  is  probably  the 
oldest  of  all  cultivated  fruit  trees.  It  is  one  of  the 
earliest  mentioned  in  the  Bible  and  other  ancient 
writings.  The  oil-producing  plants  were  not  so 
numerous  as  now,  and  oil  was  a  staple  product, 
with  many  uses. 

The  Mediterranean  countries  cultivated  the 
olive  tree  when  the  Aryan  peoples  migrated  west- 
ward. North  Africa,  Australia,  and  now  the 
great  Southwest  in  our  own  country  are  olive- 
growing  regions  that  ship  the  oil  and  the  fruit  to 
parts  of  the  world  too  cold  for  the  trees  to  grow. 

France  and  Spain  and  Italy  produce  much  of  the 
oil  sent  to  America,  but  no  better  oil  is  made  than 
that  which  California  sends  to  market.  We  need 
a  few  years  more  to  learn  this  important  fact,  for 
we  still  cling  to  the  idea  that  things  "imported" 
are  better  than  home  products.  Slowly  we  are 
getting  over  this  foolish  notion. 

When  the  olives  drop  from  a  branch  that  is 
shaken,  it  is  time  to  pick  them,  even  though  they 
be  hard  and  green,  if  pickled  green  olives  are  to  be 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT 

made.  If  they  are  to  be  pickled  ripe,  or  pressed 
for  oil,  they  are  left  until  ripe,  but  not  so  long  that 
they  turn  black  and  soften.  If  picked  too  early, 
the  oil  tastes  bitter;  if  too  late,  it  is  rancid.  So  the 
picking  must  be  carefully  timed.  Then,  it  must 
be  done  by  hand,  and  the  fruit  cleaned  of  any 
spoiled  or  shrivelled  specimens. 

The  -idea  of  eating  fresh  fruits  off  of  the  trees 
will  do  in  the  case  of  oranges  and  grapefruit  in 
California,  but  olives,  green  or  ripe,  are  bitter  and 
utterly  distasteful  in  the  natural  state. 

To  pickle  green  olives,  the  workers  soak  them 
in  weak  lye  to  take  out  the  bitter  taste,  then  rinse 
and  soak  in  brine,  with  certain  aromatic  flavorings. 

The  better  method  is  to  pickle  the  fruit  ripe,  but 
this  process  is  far  more  difficult.  The  same  proc- 
esses are  necessary,  but  they  take  longer  time, 
and  the  softening  and  discoloration  of  the  fruit 
must  be  guarded  against.  The  nutty  flavor  of 
the  ripe  olive,  and  its  oily  content,  make  it  one  of 
the  most  nutritious  and  agreeable  of  foods.  The 
green  olive  is  an  appetizer,  and  that  is  about  all 
one  can  claim  for  it. 

The  extracting  of  oil  from  olives  is  simple. 
Any  one  with  a  cider  press  can  do  it.  In  this  way 
families  supply  themselves  with  oil  for  salads  and 
for  cooking,  in  various  olive-growing  communities. 


252  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

But  for  commercial  oil  production,  mills  are  estab- 
lished that  handle  the  yield  of  entire  sections, 
thus  making  the  crop  more  profitable  for  all  con- 
cerned, t 

The  olives  are  dried  slightly  in  the  sun,  or  by 
artificial  heat,  to  make  handling  easier.  Then 
they  are  crushed,  pits  and  flesh,  to  break  the  cells 
that  contain  the  oil.  Next,  the  "pomace"  is 
formed  into  blocks  a  yard  square  and  three  inches 
thick,  called  "cheeses,"  between  folds  of  thick 
linen  crash.  Ten  cheeses,  separated  by  frames 
made  of  wooden  slats,  are  piled  one  upon  another, 
and  a  gentle  pressure  starts  the  oil  to  flowing. 
This  is  the  best.  It  is  called  "virgin  oil,"  and 
generally  goes  in  with  the  next  grade,  making  the 
most  expensive  quality  sold. 

Before  the  third  pressing,  the  cakes  are  broken 
up  in  water,  cold  or  hot.  The  last  pressing  gets 
only  inferior  oil,  used  for  lighting  or  soap-making. 

From  the  presses  the  oil  flows  into  settling  vats. 
It  is  dark  in  color,  and  contains  impurities  that 
form  a  sediment.  From  one  vat  to  another  the 
oil  is  drawn,  until,  at  the  end  of  four  or  five 
months,  it  is  clear  yellow,  and  ready  for  sealing 
in  bottles  or  tins. 

The  Padres  brought  the  olive  trees  from  Spain 
into  Mexico,  and  California.  The  "Mission" 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  253 

olive,  planted  around  the  old  Franciscan  missions, 
is  the  variety  best  known  and  best  liked  in  Cali- 
fornia. Wherever  the  climate  is  hot  and  the  air 
dry,  olives  grow  pn  irrigated  land.  But  a  humid 
climate  will  not  do.  So  the  olive  is  not  a  fruit  of 
the  Tropics. 

TOMATOES 

Your  grandmother  has  told  you  that  in  her 
childhood  people  grew  for  mere  curiosity  a  plant 
that  bore  red  fruits  called  "love  apples."  They 
brought  them  in  when  ripe,  and  set  them  on  the 
mantelpiece  to  admire,  until  a  break  in  the  skin,  or 
a  soft  spot  warned  of  approaching  decay.  To  eat 
one  of  these  fruits  was  not  thought  of.  Couldn't 
one  tell  by  the  rank  smell  of  the  sappy  stems  that 
the  plant  is  poisonous? 

If  any  one  had  dared  to  taste  one  of  these  little 
red  "apples,"  he  would  have  found  it  tasteless, 
full  of  seeds  and  thick,  green  partitions,  one  or 
more,  separating  the  interior  into  compartments. 
The  botanist  who  named  the  wild  tomato  plant 
must  have  tasted  the  fruit,  and  found  it  bad 
enough,  for  he  gave  it  the  Latin  name,  Lycoper- 
sicum,  which  means  "wolf-peach"  —  a  peach  fit 
only  for  the  meanest  of  wild  beasts,  the  dread  of 
mankind.  He  knew  the  plant  belongs  to  the 


254  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

Nightshade  Family,  all  poisonous,  as  well  as  bitter 
to  the  taste. 

The  beauty  of  its  red  berries  brought  the  tomato 
into  gardens.  Selection  of  the  biggest  berries 
for  seed  led  to  the  gradual  improvement  of  the 
species,  and  the  modification  of  the  typical  fruit 
in  form,  in  size,  and  in  color.  The  earliest  toma- 
toes were  the  cherry,  currant,  and  pear;  small- 
fruited  varieties  resembling  the  edible  fruits  for 
which  they  were  named.  Two  hundred  years  ago 
yellow  forms  were  grown.  About  the  beginning 
of  the  nineteenth  century  certain  horticulturists 
began  the  improvement  of  the  tomato  as  a  garden 
vegetable,  and  through  their  efforts  the  host  of 
fine  varieties  has  been  developed. 

The  little  cherry  variety  is  worth  growing  as  an 
ornamental  plant,  and  the  cluster-fruited  currant 
tomatoes  will  cover  an  unsightly  rubbish  heap,  and 
make  it  a  thing  of  beauty  along  the  road.  But 
over  the  garden  wall  see  the  great,  .smooth  "love 
apples!"  The  ridged  partitions  are  firm,  juicy 
flesh,  and  the  seeds  are  scarce  and  negligible  under 
the  thin  skin  of  the  best  salad  fruit  in  the  world! 
If  you  like  variety,  there  are  white  tomatoes, 
yellow  ones,  pink-cheeked  ones,  as  delicately  tinted 
as  any  peach.  If  red  is  the  only  color  for  you, 
there  are  the  scarlet  and  the  crimson  varieties, 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  255 

and  the  deep,  purplish  ones.  The  Ponderosas 
weigh  two  and  three  pounds,  and  measure  near 
twenty  inches  in  circumference.  Higher  quality 
is  found  in  varieties  of  smaller  size.  Early,  mid- 
season,  and  late  varieties  cover  the  growing  season, 
furnishing  material  for  the  canneries,  the  pickle 
factories,  and  the  table.  Besides  salads,  which  use 
the  tomatoes  raw,  either  whole  or  sliced,  there  are 
soups,  stews,  and  various  made  dishes  that  use 
them.  Stewed  or  baked  tomatoes  are  delicious. 
The  small  varieties  are  used  whole  in  preserves 
and  marmalades.  Ketchups  and  relishes  of  other 
sorts  are  made  for  winter  use  from  ripe  tomatoes. 
Green  ones  are  made  into  similar  piquant  sauces  to 
serve  with  meats. 

The  best  tomato  region  has  a  long-growing 
season,  warm  soil,  and  abundance  of  sunshine. 
The  soil  needs  not  be  very  rich,  but  it  must  be 
moist  and  well-drained.  The  stems  are  flexible, 
and  need  staking  as  soon  as  they  begin  to  bear 
fruit.  The  flowers  appear  early,  in  clusters  at  the 
joints,  the  little  yellow  bells  soon  followed  by  the 
berries,  that  weigh  the  branches  down,  and  cause 
the  whole  plant  to  sprawl  on  the  ground  unless  it 
is  tied  up  to  a  stiff  support. 

Tons  of  tomatoes  are  grown  in  fields  of  the  South 
for  shipment  to  northern  markets  before  local 


256      THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

market  gardeners  can  supply  the  demand.  The 
price  of  fresh  tomatoes  in  winter  and  early  spring 
is  high,  but  gradually  goes  down  as  spring  brings 
in  the  crop  from  the  Carolinas,  Virginia,  Delaware, 
and  New  Jersey,  to  the  New  York  markets.  In 
the  gardens  and  fields  of  warm  parts  of  the  world, 
the  tomato  plants  are  practically  ever-bearing. 
In  colder  sections  they  are  sensitive  to  frost,  and 
are  grown  as  annuals.  Tomatoes  for  Thanks- 
giving Day  salads  may  be  had  in  the  North  by 
pulling  up  the  plants  and  hanging  them  in  the 
cellar  loaded  with  their  green  fruits.  These 
will  ripen  gradually,  and  so  furnish  the  fruit  long 
after  frost  has  killed  the  plants  outdoors. 

EGG-PLANTS 

The  botanist  defines  a  berry  as  a  fleshy  pericarp 
with  many  seeds.  This  is  not  what  the  horti- 
culturist means,  for  a  berry  to  him  means  a  little, 
soft,  sweet  fruit,  without  reference  to  its  struct- 
ure. Botanically  speaking,  the  egg-plant,  is  a  giant 
berry.  With  it  ranks  the  potato  ball,  and  the 
tomato,  as  well  as  currants  and  gooseberries. 
And  blackberries  and  raspberries  are  not  berries, 
but  aggregate  fruits. 

The  egg-plant  is  one  of  the  nightshade  group, 


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SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  257 

a  member  of  the  same  genus  with  the  potato. 
Native  of  India,  it  has  spread  widely  in  warm 
countries,  and  hardy  varieties  have  made  possible 
its  culture  in  regions  where  the  climate  is  moder- 
ately cold,  and  the  growing  season  short.  The 
little  plants  are  well  grown  under  glass,  until  the 
soil  is  warm  enough  to  insure  quick  and  continuous 
growth  in  the  garden.  The  fruit  furnishes  a  most 
acceptable  vegetable  food  to  people  who  live  in 
desert  and  semi-arid  regions. 

The  purple,  smooth  egg-plants  grow  larger  than 
a  man's  head,  oval,  as  a  rule,  though  some  vari- 
eties are  elongated  to  resemble  cucumbers.  The 
flesh  is  white,  and  waxy,  but  firm,  and  darkens  on 
exposure  to  air.  It  is  usual  to  slice  the  fruit  after 
peeling  it,  and  sprinkle  salt  between  the  layers; 
then  place  a  weight  upon  them  to  press  out  the 
water.  Drained  of  this  accumulation  of  undesir- 
able liquid,  the  slices  are  ready,  in  an  hour,  to  be 
dipped  in  egg,  then  in  cracker  crumbs,  then  fried 
in  butter,  peppered  lightly,  and  served  hot  as 
may  be.  Stuffed  with  a  mixture  of  chopped  meat 
and  breadcrumbs,  rather  highly  seasoned,  the 
whole  egg-plant  is  often  baked  in  its  skin.  The 
filling  seasons  the  rather  insipid  flesh,  and  absorbs 
its  excess  moisture. 

One  plant  yields  a  dozen  fruits  in  the  South. 


258  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

In  the  North,  half  that  number  will  be  a  fair  yield 
before  frost  cuts  short  the  season.  The  little 
fruits  are  edible,  but  rather  peppery,  compared 
with  large  ones.  The  market  sizes  range  about  as 
muskmelons  do. 

The  egg-plant  produces  its  fruit  even  though 
failure  of  the  blossoms  to  be  pollenated  results 
in  seedless  forms.  From  the  cook's  standpoint, 
this  improves  the  vegetable. 

RED   PEPPERS 

The  big,  green  "bell  peppers"  are  now  as  com- 
mon as  any  vegetable,  and  mild  enough  to  make 
a  most  agreeable  addition  to  salads.  But  their 
ancestors,  and  some  of  their  near  relatives,  are  hot 
as  fire,  due  to  a  bitter  juice  that  is  especially  strong 
in  the  seeds  and  the  tissues  to  which  they  are 
attached.  Cutting  out  the  white  "cores"  re- 
moves the  burning  parts,  and  the  walls  of  the  pods 
are  ready  to  eat,  raw  or  cooked.  They  "go  with  " 
tomatoes  particularly  well,  each  adding  a  good 
flavor  to  the  other  when  stewed  together.  When 
ripened,  the  bell  peppers  are  red  and  hotter  in  taste 
than  before,  but  they  are  milder  still  than  the  little 
varieties.  Peppers  seem  to  be  hottest  in  the 
smallest  kinds.  Strangely,  it  would  seem,  people 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  259 

of  hot  countries  like  peppery  foods,  A  hot 
stomach  may  act  as  a  counter-irritant  to  the  hot 
climate. 

The  tiny,  slim  peppers  of  Tabasco  sauce  are  the 
hottest  of  the  hot,  cylindrical  peppers.  One  of 
these  furnishes  the  Cayenne  pepper  of  commerce. 
The  thin,  red  shell  is  ground  when  dry,  and  used 
sparingly  as  a  condiment.  It  is  much  more  whole- 
some than  black  pepper. 

Chillies,  or  Chiles,  are  group  names  applied  to 
the  little,  hot  peppers  so  universally  used  in  hot 
countries  to  season  stews  and  other  savory  dishes. 
One  sees  strings  of  these  little  red  fingers  hang- 
ing up  to  dry  over  the  entrances  to  houses  and 
shops  in  Mexico  and  the  south  of  Europe.  The 
fiery  temperament  of  the  Latin  races  may 
demand  fiery  condiments;  or  it  may  be  the 
result  of  such  appetite.  We  Northerners  would 
not  like  to  spare  the  dash  of  red  pepper  in 
our  salads,  the  piquant  flavor  of  the  fresh  red 
peppers  in  mixed  pickles,  nor  the  mild  vegetable 
developed  by  plant  breeders  as  large  as  an  apple, 
and  enjoyable  eaten  out  of  the  hand,  like  an 
apple. 

Paprika  is  a  red  powder  made  of  the  dry  pods 
of  mild,  sweet  peppers.  It  can  be  used  far  more 
freely  than  the  pungent  Cayenne. 


260  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

CUCUMBERS 

The  balsam  apple  and  the  burr  cucumber,  that 
wind  their  branching  tendrils  over  the  shrubby 
growth  of  neglected  fence  rows,  along  the  river 
banks,  and  hang  their  spiny  fruits  where  all  can 
see,  are  the  wild  representatives  we  have  of  a  great 
botanical  family,  that  has  furnished  us  many  use- 
ful garden  vegetables  and  fruits.  In  the  Order 
Cucurbitacese,  belong  melons,  pumpkins,  squashes, 
gourds,  and  cucumbers.  Any  one  would  class 
them  together,  for  all  have  the  distinct  form  and 
seed  arrangement  that  the  botanists  call  a  pepo. 

The  English  gardener  classes  pumpkin  and 
squash  and  vegetable  marrow  under  the  group 
name,  gourd.  This  is  not  the  American  way. 
We  group  all  under  the  name,  cucurbits.  The 
members  prove  their  tropical  origin  by  being 
sensitive  to  cold,  requiring,  in  northern  gardens, 
to  be  started  in  warm  quarters,  and  set  in  the 
ground  when  the  weather  is  warm. 

They  have  another  peculiarity:  they  get  a 
severe  check  in  growth  if  the  roots  are  disturbed 
by  transplanting.  The  practice  is  to  start  the 
seeds  in  bricks  of  inverted  sod,  or  in  soil  packed  in 
flower  pots  or  berry  boxes.  The  sod  or  box  can 
be  set  in  the  ground  without  disturbing  the  little 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  26 1 

plant  at  all.  The  earth  in  the  pot,  too,  can  be 
slipped  out  and  planted. 

The  cucumber  is  a  native  of  the  East  Indies,  and 
has  been  cultivated  in  China  for  three  thousand 
years.  One  of  the  staple  foods  of  the  peoples  of 
the  Far  East  is  boiled  cucumbers.  Europeans 
boil  them,  and  also  make  them  into  pickles  and 
preserves.  The  flowers  appear  in  the  axils  of 
the  leaves,  staminate  and  pistillate  separate,  but 
borne  on  the  same  plant.  The  pistillate  flowers 
wither,  and  the  little  button  under  the  greenish- 
yellow  corolla  develops  into  the  elongated  fruit. 
The  rough  "gherkin"  type  of  cucumber,  grown 
for  pickles,  is  cut  before  the  faded  flower  drops 
from  the  tip.  The  choicest  sweet  pickles,  by  our 
standards,  are  scarcely  two  inches  long,  though 
more  commonly  we  let  them  grow  to  twice  that 
length  before  cutting.  The  vines  go  on  bearing  all 
summer.  For  salads,  cucumbers  are  grown  almost 
to  mature  size. 

Ripe  cucumbers  are  indigestible,  when  eaten 
raw,  and  their  seeds  are  hard.  The  flesh  is  used 
for  sweet  pickles  and  preserves,  as  the  white  inner 
rind  of  watermelon  is,  with  lemon  peel  and  spices 
to  give  it  added  flavor. 

Cucumber  vines  spread  six  or  eight  feet  from 
the  hill,  so  they  must  be  given  enough  room,  or 


262  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

they  hinder  each  other  by  overrunning  their 
neighbors'  territory.  They  must  have  the  sun  and 
air.  Then  they  bear  tremendously,  unless  the 
ground  gets  too  dry,  and  the  vines  burn  under 
the  combined  heat  of  sun  and  winds. 

Unusual  forms  or  cucumbers  are  grown  for 
curiosity.  The  snake  or  serpent  species  is  more  a 
melon  than  a  cucumber.  It  grows  three  or  four 
feet  long,  twisting  its  slender  body  in  and  out 
among  the  foliage,  and  finally  turning  yellow  as 
it  ripens.  The  oldest  varieties  were  three-angled, 
indicating  the  fact  that  the  seeds  are  arranged 
in  long  ridges,  as  we  see  when  slicing  any  cu- 
cumber crosswise. 

Lemon  cucumbers  are  globular  or  slightly  oval, 
and  about  the  size  and  color  of  a  lemon.  In  flesh 
and  flavor  they  are  very  delicate.  The  California 
gardener  brings  them  to  your  door,  and  they  grow 
to  perfection  in  gardens  outside  of  New  York  City. 
So  they  may  be  had  by  us  in  most  any  warm  tem- 
perate region.  They  lend  a  pleasant  variety  to 
garden  cucumbers,  and,  having  so  little  green  in 
the  skins,  they  lack  the  bitter  taste  that  ordinary 
cucumbers  have.  We  must  believe  that  they  are 
more  digestible  than  the  green  ones.  As  a  salad 
vegetable  this  variety  is  especially  welcomed  by 
all  who  are  devoted  to  cucumbers,  but  must  eat 


SEED-VESSELS   WE    EAT  263 

them    sparingly,    if    not  count    them    forbidden 
fruit. 

" Gherkin"  is  a  name  applied  popularly  to  any 
small,  pickling  cucumber.  The  original  gherkin 
is  a  native  of  Jamaica,  largely  grown  in  the  West 
Indies  for  pickles,  and  to  be  eaten  boiled.  The 
vines  are  very  prolific,  and  the  long-stemmed,  oval 
fruits",  about  two  inches  long,  are  streaked  green 
and  white  until  ripe,  when  they  turn  yellow. 
They  are  covered  with  fleshy  spines,  and  full  of 
seeds. 


Beverage  Plants 


CHAPTER  vm 

CACAO 

IF  A- census  could  be  taken  of  all  hungry  chil- 
dren to-day,  and  they  could  have  "just  what  they 
want"  to  cure  what  ails  them,  the  order  for  choco- 
late would  be  bigger  than  for  any  other  on  the 
list.  Here  is  a  candy  that  is  a  nutritious  food,  too. 
It  has  not  the  objectionable  features  of  most 
candies,  if  good  grades  are  bought.  A  generation 
ago,  childre*n  had  never  heard  of  chocolate,  and 
very  little  came  to  America.  To  illustrate  how 
suddenly  chocolate  and  cocoa  have  come  in:  the 
imports  increased  70  per  cent,  between  1901  and 
1905,  amounting  to  70,000,000  pounds  annually 
at  the  time  of  the  last  census.  European  coun- 
tries are  quite  as  fond  of  chocolate  as  the 
United  States.  Hamburg  is  the  greatest  port 
and  distributing  centre  for  this  article.  Havre 
is  second.  The  Dutch  are  great  chocolate  and 
cocoa  manufacturers  and  consumers.  So  are 
the  Swiss.  Much  of  our  importation  is  from 
these  countries,  as  the  labels  tell  us.  The  raw 

367 


268  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

materials  for  our  own  factories  come  chiefly  from 
Trinidad. 

The  cacao  is  a  small  tropical  tree  whose  hard 
seeds  furnish  the  cocoa  and  chocolate  of  com- 
merce. "Cocoa"  is  merely  a  misspelling  of  the 
Spanish  name  of  the  tree.  When  the  botanist, 
Linnaeus,  was  called  upon  to  give  the  tree  a 
scientific  name,  he  sampled  its  fruit  in  the  form 
of  a  cup  of  hot  chocolate.  So  happy  it  made  the 
great  man  to  know  that  any  tree  could  produce  so 
delicious  a  beverage,  he  did  not  hesitate  a  moment. 
He  called  it  "Theobroma,"  which  means  "food 
of  the  gods."  By  that  name  botanists  all  call 
the  cacao  trees. 

Off  in  the  river  bottoms  o!  parts  of  Central  and 
South  America,  the  Theobroma  grows  wild.  The 
trees  are  also  found  in  rank  forests  in  British 
Guiana,  under  Dutch  rule  called  Demarara. 

When  the  Spanish  explorers  came  to  Mexico 
first  they  found  the  natives  growing  plantations  of 
cacao  trees  they  had  transplanted  from  the  wilds. 
From  that  day  the  cultivation  of  the  tree  has 
spread  to  the  tropics  of  all  countries. 

The  traveller  who  visits  the  cacao  plantations 
notes  with  surprise  that  the  cultivated  trees  do 
not  differ  from  the  wild  ones;  that  new  orchards 
are  grown  from  seed,  or  from  little  trees  dug  out 


BEVERAGE   PLANTS  269 

of  the  woods.  The  idea  of  improving  the  stock 
by  selection,  and  multiplying  varieties  by  grafting 
and  budding  in  nurseries,  has  not  yet  been  put 
into  practice.  The  cacao  industry  is  waiting  for 
northern  scientific  minds  to  work  out  these  prob- 
lems. 

The  most  important  fact  so  far  discovered  by 
'growers,  of  the  tree  is  that,  though  it  is  almost 
universal  to  see  the  plantations  on  moist  ground, 
the  trees  do  far  better  on  upland  soil.  It  re- 
quires care  to  make  the  little  trees  comfortable 
when  first  transplanted.  They  must  be  watered 
and  shaded  by  taller  plants  for  a  time. 

The  native  planters  learned  long  ago  that  pod-, 
bearing  plants  are  best  as  "nurse  trees"  to  the 
cacaos.  They  did  not  know  why.  We  know 
that  only  the  plants  of  the  pod-bearing  family 
gather  nitrogen  from  the  air  and  store  it  in  nodules 
on  the  roots.  When  the  tops  die,  the  stored  ni- 
trogen is  given  to  the  soil  by  the  slow  decay  of  the 
roots.  So  the  leguminous  nurse  trees  first  protect 
the  cacaos  from  sun  and  wind,  but  afterward  they 
feed  them. 

The  cacao  grows  to  thirty  feet  in  height,  and' 
reaches  the  end  of  its  bearing  period  at  about 
thirty-six  years.  Four-year-old  trees  begin  to 
bear.  The  fruit  is  a  rough,  red, "  yellow,  or  brown 


27O      THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

pod,  six  inches  to  a  foot  long,  tapering  at  each  end. 
Inside  the  rind  is  a  pulpy  mass  in  which  are  em- 
bedded twenty  to  thirty-five  hard  seeds,  clustered 
somewhat  as  watermelon  seeds  are,  at  the  centre 
of  the  pod.  The  seeds  are  the  useful  parts. 

Gathering  the  cacao  pods  is  particular  business, 
and  must  be  done  by  hand.  They  grow  out  of 
the  main  trunk,  and  out  of  the  big  branches,  a 
very  strange  arrangement  it  seems  to  those  who 
are  used  to  seeing  oranges  and  apples  borne  on 
the  slender  branches  of  the  trees.  In  cutting  the 
pods  from  the  trunk  one  must  avoid  cutting  the 
encircling  buds  that  are  set  close  to  the  stem  of 
each.  New  pods  come  from  these  buds.  A 
single  fruit  follows  each  cluster  of  blossoms. 

The  best  way  to  proceed  is  to  open  the  pods  at 
once  after  they  are  gathered,  and  put  the  beans 
in  a  box  that  slowly  revolves,  so  as  to  give  them 
uniform  treatment,  without  loss  of  heat  during  the 
days  they  ferment,  and  lose  their  bitter  principle. 
A  week  usually  suffices. 

The  seeds  are  washed  clean,  then  graded  by 
sizes  for  even  roasting  in  rotating,  heated  drums. 
The  beans  while  roasting  lose  their  bitter  taste, 
their  starch  is  converted  into  dextrin,  and  the  fa- 
miliar aroma  of  cocoa  is  developed.  Next,  the  thin 
hulls  are  easily  loosened  by  a  gentle,  rolling  press- 


BEVERAGE    PLANTS  27! 

ure,  for  heat  has  made  them  brittle.  A  winnow- 
ing process  separates  them,  leaving  the  solid 
meats,  now  called  "cocoa  nibs."  They  break 
easily;  indeed  there  is  no  way  to  prevent  them 
from  breaking  while  the  hulls  are  being  removed. 
We  can  buy  cocoa  as  nibs  in  grocery  stores.  Some 
people  make  cocoa  by  boiling  these.  Others  are 
better  pleased  with  the  ground  beans;  the  nibs 
make  a  beverage  too  rich  for  their  taste.  The 
difference  is  this:  The  nibs  contain  cocoa  oil; 
it  constitutes  50  per  cent,  of  the  substance  of 
them. 

In  the  manufacture  of  cocoa,  the  nibs  are  ground 
fine,  and  the  mass  is  subjected  to  great  pressure. 
The  fat  oozes  out  and  hardens  into  yellowish  cocoa 
butter.  What  is  left  is  a  cake  of  brown  substance, 
which  again  goes  through  the  grinders,  and  is 
ready  to  be  boxed  and  labelled  for  sale.  This  is 
the  unsweetened  cocoa  we  buy. 

The  cocoa  butter  extracted  turns  white  in  course 
of  time,  but  it  keeps  without  becoming  rancid;  so 
it  is  used  in  making  ointments  and  salves  that 
druggists  keep  for  sale. 

One  objection  to  the  manufactured  cocoa  is 
that  it  is  frequently  adulterated  with  cheap  starch 
like  Brazilian  arrowroot.  Only  the  reputation  of 
good  manufacturers  can  defend  the  public  from 


272  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

impositions  like  this.  The  same  is  true  of  choco- 
late manufacturers. 

In  making  a  cup  of  cocoa,  the  cook  usually 
adds  sugar.  In  making  chocolate,  she  does  not. 
Chocolate  is  a  richer  beverage  than  cocoa.  The 
reason  is  clear  once  we  know  how  both  are  made. 
Cocoa  contains  all  there  is  in  the  nibs  except  the 
fat,  and  it  should  contain  nothing  more.  To  make 
chocolate,  the  manufacturer  grinds  the  nibs  to  a 
fine  powder,  adds  a  certain  amount  of  sugar, 
flavors  with  vanilla,  and  mixes  these  ingredients 
into  a  paste,  which  is  moulded  into  the  tablets  and 
cakes  we  buy.  For  cooking  purposes,  some  brands 
of  chocolate  are  unsweetened.  But  the  fat  is  in 
all  grades.  Rich  as  chocolates  are,  they  are  poor 
stuff  if  the  makers  have  used  glucose  for  sugar  and 
imitation  vanilla  extract,  with  a  generous  amount 
of  cheap  starch  taking  the  place  of  the  cocoa  they 
pretend  to  use.  The  cheap  chocolates  are  lacking 
not  only  in  nutritiousness  but  in  the  good  flavor 
of  the  genuine. 

The  shells  that  are  removed  from  the  nibs  are 
not  utterly  worthless.  The  drug,  theobromine,  is  ex- 
tracted from  them,  as  well  as  from  the  beans,  and 
they  are  also  used  as  food  for  cattle.  They  con- 
tain elements  that  enrich  the  soil,  therefore  they 
are  dug  in  as  fertilizer  in  orchards  of  cacao  trees. 


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BEVERAGE    PLANT!  273 

TEA 

The  American  man  who  goes  to  London  for  a 
short  stay  knows  that  the  late  afternoon  is  not  the 
time  to  do  business  with  a  Briton.  One  impor- 
tant engagement  calls  people  of  high  and  low 
degree  —  they  must  go  and  get  their  tea.  You 
cannot  stay  the  universal  impulse  with  any  protest 
that  your  time  is  limited  and  your  errand  urgent. 
Nothing  takes  precedence  of  afternoon  tea.  The 
clerks  go,  and  you  cannot  get  waited  on  in  the 
shops.  Every  business  is  shorthanded  for  the 
time  except  the  places  where  tea  is  served.  They 
are  crowded.  An  army  of  servants  move  swiftly 
forward  to  save  the  lives  of  famishing  fellow- 
countrymen',  bearing  pots  of  tea  and  hot  water, 
with  little  cakes,  and  thin  slices  of  buttered  bread. 
Before  six  o'clock  the  hum  of  industry  is  resumed. 
The  man  of  business  is  ready  to  see  you.  The 
world  is  a  good  place  to  live  in,  for  everybody  is 
fortified  by  his  tea. 

Pretty  much  the  same  the  traveller  finds  in 
other  European  cities,  where  the  British  tourist 
has  impressed  upon  the  inn-keepers  the  necessity 
for  afternoon  tea  service  of  the  kind  rigidly  his 
own.  English  tea  rooms  attract  Americans,  who 
readily  fall  into  the  tea  habit.  We  wonder  how 


274  THE    BOOK    OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

soon,  if  ever,  the  business  men  of  America  will 
take  to  tea-drinking  in  the  late  afternoon. 

Great  Britain  is  the  nation  of  tea-drinkers.  The 
colonies  follow  the  mother  country,  and  where  the 
Englishman  goes  into  the  wilds,  he  carries  his  tea- 
pot and  a  supply  of  the  dried  leaf.  The  tea  con- 
sumed in  Australasia  averages  over  seven  pounds 
a  year  for  every  man,  woman,  and  child !  England 
herself  does  not  come  up  to  this  record.  The 
whole  United  Kingdom  averages  a  little  over  six 
pounds  per  capita.  The  United  States  consumes 
one  and  a  third  pounds.  With  us,  coffee  is  the 
breakfast  beverage.  In  the  British  possessions 
it  is  breakfast  tea,  first,  last,  and  all  the  time.  Tea 
again  in  the  afternoon,  and  coffee  at  the  end  of 
dinner  —  for  the  stomach's  sake! 

The  tea  plant  is  a  shrub  that  may  grow  to  the 
height  of  thirty  feet,  if  left  to  its  own  way.  The 
leaves  are  leathery  and  tapering,  with  saw-toothed 
edges,  varying  greatly  in  size  on  the  same  twig. 
The  flowers  vary  in  color  front  white  to  deep  rose, 
their  waxy  petals  and  central  bunch  of  yellow 
stamens  making  them  look  like  single  wild  roses. 
The  seeds  are  usually  three,  a  single  one  being 
borne  in  each  of  three  cells  of  the  dry  capsule. 

A  near  relative  of  the  camellia,  the  tea  plant 
deserves  to  be  cultivated  for  its  bloom  and  its 


BEVERAGE    PLANTS  275 

beautiful  foliage.  It  requires  a  climate  that  is  at 
least  warm  temperate,  so  it  is  not  hardy  north  of 
our  Gulf  states.  In  these  it  is  by  no  means  an 
uncommon  plant. 

The  leaf  is  the  only  commercial  product  of  the 
tea  plant.  For  this  it  has  been  cultivated  foi 
five  thousand  years,  if  we  can  believe  the  ancient 
Chinese,  writings  that  make  mention  of  it.  Until 
500  A.  D.,  tea  leaves  were  used  as  a  medicine  only. 
Then  tea  became  a  beverage,  and  sprang  into 
popularity  in  the  Orient. 

In  Assam,  a  province  of  India  that  borders  on 
China,  a  species  of  tea  has  been  found  growing  wild, 
and  botanists  have  considered  this  fact  as  evidence 
that  this  i&  the  ancestral  home  of  the  plant. 
Tradition  says  that  China  is  its  home.  Nobody 
can  prove  either  claim.  The  interesting  fact  is 
that  from  the  wild  tea  have  sprung  varieties  that 
thrive  in  all  tropical  countries,  and  the  industry 
based  on  tea  culture  is  one  of  the  most  important 
in  the  commercial  world. 

America,  which  is  not  a  good  customer  of  the 
tea  merchant,  buys  each  year  over  four  million 
pounds  from  Japan  alone.  Fifteen  million  dollars 
a  year  we  spend  for  tea  in  oriental  markets.  And 
we  are  not  obliged  to  buy  abroad  either,  for  tea 
from  South  Carolina  plantations  is  now  to  be  had. 


2/6      THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

Farmers9  Bulletin  No.  301,  of  the  Department  of 
Agriculture  at  Washington  tells  all  about  this. 
Write  for  George  F.  Mitchell's  report  on  "Home- 
grown Tea, "  stating  the  number  of  the  bulletin  as 
above,  and  it  will  be  sent  you  free. 

Very  amusing  are  the  accounts  of  the  early 
attempts  to  introduce  to  a  skeptical  public  the 
plants  we  now  use  so  commonly  that  we  assume 
they  have  always  been  used.  China  taught  the 
other  Eastern  countries  to  drink  tea.  Tradition 
says  that  in  the  days  of  "good  Queen  Bess"  a 
package  of  tea  was  sent  to  an  old  couple  in  England 
by  their  son  who  was  a  sailor,  and  saw  much  of  the 
world.  They  brewed  the  tea  as  he  told  them  to, 
but  threw  away  the  brown  liquid,  and  ate  the 
leaves  spread  on  their  bread!  About  the  middle 
of  the  seventeenth  century  a  tea  house  was  opened 
in  London,  but  the  new  beverage  was  expensive 
and  did  not  come  into  general  use  until  many 
years  later,  when  British  India  began  to  send  home 
tea  grown  in  her  own  tea  gardens.  The  beginning 
of  this  great  enterprise  dates  at  the  year  1840. 
The  contest  between  India  and  China,  the  two 
great  rivals  for  the  tea  trade  of  civilized  countries, 
has  been  going  on  ever  since,  and  the  British 
growers  have  beaten  their  competitors.  But 
China  has  a  big  home  market,  and  Asiatic  countries 


BEVERAGE   PLANTS  277 

deal  largely  with  their  neighbor  on  the  east.  And 
the  demand  for  tea  is  growing  in  all  countries  except 
the  United  States  where  it  is  falling  off. 

The  tea  seed  is  started  in  a  special  seed  bed,  and 
the  little  plants  set  out  irrigated  in  nursery  rows 
that  are  well  tended,  and  sheltered  from  the  sun. 
When  about  a  foot  high  they  are  transplanted  and 
cultivated  until  they  are  three  years  old.  Then 
they  are  well  covered  with  young  leaf  shoots 
called  "flush,"  and  the  first  picking  is  done.  As 
the  branches  lengthen,  pruning  is  needed  to  induce 
the  sprouting  of  new  leafy  shoots.  This  "flush" 
is  constantly  renewed,  and  the  bearing  of  flowers 
is  discouraged. 

The  plucking  is  hand-work  of  a  very  particular 
kind.  It  is  an  open  question  whether  or  not  tea 
can  be  profitably  raised  in  the  Southern  States, 
where  labor  costs  so  much  more  than  in  China 
and  India  and  Ceylon.  There  coolie  labor  costs 
very  little.  Tea  growing  is  practicable  in  this 
country.  But  tea  harvesting  may  be  impracti- 
cable. 

If  one  could  only  be  sure  he  is  getting  what  he 
pays  for,  he  might  be  more  interested  in  the  fol- 
lowing classification  and  names  of  brands  used  in 
Ceylon.  The  three  leaves  nearest  the  tip  of  the 
shoots  make  the  "pekoe"  teas.  The  larger  leaves 


278  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

below  make  "souchong,"  and  then  "congou"  teas. 
The  tip  leaf, smallest  of  all, makes " flowery  pekoe"; 
the  second  leaf,  "orange  pekoe";  the  third,  just 
"pekoe."  A  mixture  of  this  size  with  the  next 
makes  "pekoe-souchong"  tea.  The  younger  the 
leaf  and  smaller,  the  more  delicate  and  expensive 
the  tea. 

Green  tea  and  black  tea  are  differently  made. 
All  tea  leaves  may  be  made  into  either,  though 
some  varieties  are  more  easily  converted  into  black 
than  others.  And  green  teas  are  made  from  leaves 
grown  in  cooler  climates,  while  black  teas  are  the 
more  common  product  of  the  warmer  regions 
where  tea  is  grown.  Some  regions  make  both 
kinds. 

Green  tea  is  made  by  rolling  the  leaves  and 
then  drying  them.  Rolling  breaks  the  cells  that 
contain  the  refreshing,  stimulating  principle, 
theine,  and  the  astringent  acid,  tannin,  that  gives 
flavor  to  the  beverage.  Without  the  process,  the 
flavor  would  remain  locked  up  in  the  leaf  cells. 
The  rolling  allows  the  oil  to  spread  over  the  leaf 
as  it  dries.  Green  tea  which  is  laid  out  in  the  open 
air  after  the  rolling  process  until  a  fermenting  and 
oxidizing  process  takes  place  changes  to  a  dark 
color,  from  which  it  later  takes  the  name,  "black 


tea." 


BEVERAGE    PLANTS  279 

Different  countries  have  their  own  methods  of 
curing  tea.  They  involve  much  special  knowledge 
and  skill,  much  use  of  the  hands  and  sometimes 
the  feet!  This  Bourse  of  moulding,  rolling,  tread- 
ing, and  firing  is  a  secret  in  some  parts  of  China. 
But  the  essential  processes  are  known,  and  machin- 
ery has  been  substituted  for  coolie  labor  in  some 
places.-  The  product  so  pleases  the  tea  experts 
that  more  modern  methods  will  surely  supersede 
the  time-honored,  primitive  ones. 

Green  tea  is  distrusted  because  coloring  matter 
is  often  used  to  give  it  a  more  attractive  appear- 
ance. Since  the  American  trade  demands  a 
green  tea,^and  does  not  exclude,  by  law,  teas  con- 
taining injurious  dyes,  we  can  hardly  blame  the 
shrewd  manufacturers  for  catering  to  our  taste. 

COFFEE 

The  coffee  shrub  is  grown  in  sections  of  all 
tropical  countries,  producing  yearly  for  the  mar- 
kets of  the  world  1,500,000,000  pounds  of  the 
beans.  Brazil  raises  three  fourths  of  this  crop. 
The  United  States  consumes  one  half  of  the  world's 
coffee  crop.  This  astonishing  demand  places  the 
average  for  each  man,  woman,  and  child  in  the 
country  between  eleven  and  twelve  pounds. 
Great  Britain  consumes  less  than  one  pound  per 


28O  THE    BOOK   OP   USEFUL   PLANTS 

capita.  So  we  are  the  great  coffee-drinkers  of 
the  globe,  as  the  English  are  the  great  tea-drinkers. 
Only  Norway,  Sweden,  and  Holland  are  addicted 
to  the  coffee  habit  to  the  extent  that  we  Ameri- 
cans are.  Germany  has  a  coffee  average  equal  to 
England's  consumption  of  tea. 

Much  tea  is  grown  in  little  gardens.  Coffee 
is  grown  on  plantations  of  considerable  extent. 
More  than  fifty  thousand  of  these  estates  are  the 
producers  of  the  coffee  crop,  all  employing  cheap 
native  labor,  and  using  more  or  less  modern 
methods  and  machinery  in  growing  and  preparing 
the  crop  for  market. 

The  best  coffee  regions  have  an  even  tempera- 
ture, far  cooler  than  the  tropics  at  sea  level,  and 
abundant  rainfall.  The  right  climatic  conditions 
are  best  found  on  hills  or  mountain  sides  of  about 
two  thousand  feet  elevation.  The  altitude  ranges, 
however,  from  one  thousand  to  twenty-five  hun- 
dred feet.  The  thermometer  must  not  fall  below 
60  °  F.,  and  the  soil  must  be  rich  and  deep,  with 
much  humus,  to  hold  moisture  and  to  prevent 
washing  when  the  hard  rains  come.  Virgin  for- 
ests are  cleared  for  coffee.  In  spite  of  the  labor 
of  getting  trees  off,  the  soil  is  rich  and  free  from 
weeds,  and  such  new  plantations  justify  the  hard 
work  of  clearing. 


BEVERAGE   PLANTS 

Now  we  come  to  the  plant  itself,  with  some 
curiosity,  for  few  of  us  who  read  about  it  have  ever 
seen  it  growing,  or  ever  expect  to.  Ride  up  to  one 
of  the  coffee  plantations  that  covers  the  hillsides 
in  Brazil  or  Porto  Rico,  and  the  courteous  owner 
will  send  some  competent  person  to  show  you 
around.  He  is  pleased  if  you  express  a  wish  to 
see  the  industry  of  coffee-growing  from  the  be- 
ginning. 

The  seed  bed  is  in  a  sheltered  corner,  with 
screens  to  keep  both  sun  and  wind  from  the  plants 
that  come  up  after  the  sowing  of  seeds.  If  the 
first  whorl  of  leaves  is  showing,  the  plants  are 
being  reset  in  the  nursery,  where  they  have  six 
inches  of  space  around  each  one,  and  the  most 
careful  weeding,  shading,  and  protection  from 
winds.  As  the  stems  lengthen,  the  plants  are 
gradually  hardened  by  leaving  off  the  artificial 
shade,  and  when  the  fourth  leaf  whorl  is  de- 
veloped, the  plant  is  lifted,  with  all  the  undis- 
turbed earth  the  spade  can  carry,  and  set  in  its 
place  in  the  field. 

Coffee  plants  are  perennials,  of  course.  They 
have  woody  stems  that  branch  into  a  round  shrub 
form,  and  glossy  leaves  that  come  out  in  pairs 
along  the  straight,  slender  twigs,  like  leaflets  on  a 
walnut  tree. 


282  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

The  beauty  of  these  little  trees  you  will  remark 
as  they  stand  under  the  shade  of  the  nurse  trees, 
with  which  young  orchards  are  usually  set.  But 
wait  till  you  go  over  into  a  tract  of  three-year-old 
plants.  The  white  flowers  shine  like  stars,  and 
breathe  a  sweet  fragrance.  They  appear  at  the 
axils  of  the  leaves,  where  they  are  not  at  all 
numerous,  but  quite  large.  This  is  their  first 
bloom.  Three  times  a  year,  from  this  time  for- 
ward, the  plant  blooms,  the  flowers  followed  by 
fruit  that  takes  eight  months  to  mature.  This  is 
why  the  older  bushes  have  both  flowers  and  fruit 
in  the  same  cluster,  apparently. 

Light  crops  are  borne  by  coffee  plants  up  to 
the  sixth  year,  when  the  normal  habit  of  bearing 
is  reached,  and  a  pound  of  dried  berries  are  ex- 
pected as  the  yield  of  the  average  tree.  The 
berries  ripen  unevenly,  so  the  crop  is  picked  by 
hand,  and  very  carefully,  so  as  not  to  injure  the 
berries  that  are  coming  on.  The  harvest  time 
lasts  four  months.  The  picking  costs  $1.20  to 
$1.40  per  hundredweight  of  berries  in  Porto  Rico. 
Whole  families  turn  into  the  fields  at  the  coffee 
harvest,  and  it  is  as  jolly  a  season  as  cotton- 
picking  time  in  the  Southern  States,  and  the 
hop-gathering  in  New  York  State.  The  West 
Indian  negro  works  for  the  munificent  sum  of 


BEVERAGE    PLANTS  283 

35  cents  to  50  cents  a  day,  and  boys  get  from 
10  cents  up! 

The  fruits  of  tjie  coffee  plant  are  at  first  green, 
then  yellow,  then  red.  At  this  stage  they  are 
full  grown  and  look  just  like  cherries.  These 
"cherries"  are  not  good  to  eat,  though  they  are 
fleshy  and  red.  As  they  change  to  dark  wine 
color  they  are  ready  to  pick. 

The  fruit  contains  two  hard  little  seeds,  each 
flattened  on  the  side  that  lies  next  to  the  other. 
Each  seed  has  a  dry,  yellow  hull  that  fits  it  closely, 
and  a  filmy  inner  lining  of  this  horny  "parchment," 
known  in  the  coffee  industry  as  the  "silver  skin." 

When  one'of  the  beans  fails  to  "fill,"  the  single 
seed  remaining  takes  up  all  the  room,  grows  to 
unusual  size,  and  is  not  flattened.  These  seeds  are 
carefully  culled  out  of  the  company  of  the  flat 
berries,  and  sold  at  a  higher  price  under  the  trade 
name,  "pea-berries."  Another  round  seed  is  the 
berry  that  grows  alone  at  the  tip  of  each  twig. 
It  is  smaller  than  the  paired  beans,  and  is  sorted 
out  and  sold  under  the  trade  name,  Mocha. 

This  name  is  borrowed  from  a  variety  with 
small  grains  and  very  fine  flavor,  the  best  Arabian 
coffee,  which  never  gets  into  the  American  market 
at  all.  Indeed,  all  the  coffee  raised  in  Arabia  is 
called  Mocha,  and  buyers  from  Egypt  and  Tur- 


284      THE  BOOK  OP  USEFUL  PLANTS 

key  go  into  the  plantations  and  buy  the  crop  on 
the  trees.  Only  the  inferior  coffee  that  these  buy- 
ers refuse  gets  to  the  port  of  Mocha,  and  thence 
into  the  market.  So  the  trade  name,  Mocha  and 
Java,  is  misleading  in  the  extreme.  We  might 
as  well  understand  that  the  first  name  would 
better  be  dropped. 

Java  coffee  comes  from  the  Dutch  East  Indies, 
where  the  plantations  are  under  government 
control,  and  methods  are  very  thorough.  The 
Arabian  species  was  at  first  grown.  But  unfor- 
tunately a  leaf  disease  destroyed  the  industry  by 
killing  the  trees.  The  coarser  Liberian  coffee  was 
introduced  and  found  to  be  resistant  to  the  blight. 
Nothing  could  be  done  but  grow  this  less  desirable, 
but  more  vigorous  and  productive  species.  Since 
the  leaf  disease  swept  the  Islands  in  1873  and  again 
in  1878,  the  cultivation  of  Arabian  coffee  has  been 
attempted  only  by  private  enterprise,  and  for 
household  use  by  families  who  are  willing  to  take 
the  trouble  and  the  risk  for  the  chance  of  having 
the  rare,  fine  Mocha  toasted,  pulverized,  and 
steeped  as  a  morning  beverage,  just  as  their 
forefathers  had  it  in  the  good  old  days. 

Special  high  quality  is  accorded  by  experts  to 
coffee  raised  in  Bolivia.  But  the  home  market 
consumes  it  all,  so  we  cannot  test  it.  "Blue 


BEVERAGE   PLANTS  285 

Mountain"  coffee,  grown  at  high  elevations  in 
Jamaica,  commands  the  highest  prices  paid  any- 
where. This  is  a  very  small  crop,  absorbed  by  a 
very  special  trade.  Mexico  is  growing  coffee 
that  is  cheap,  as  it  competes  for  a  place  in  popular 
esteem.  Hawaii  is  an  ideal  coffee  country,  and 
growers  are  clamoring  for  protection  that  will 
enable  the  industry  to  get  on  its  feet.  They 
produce  a  large,  mild,  but  high-flavored  berry,  at 
a  cost  of  about  9  cents  per  pound. 

The  cherries  are  treated  by  the  wet  or  dry  process 
to  free  the  beans.  They  may  be  "pulped"  by 
running  through  a  mill  that  scrapes  off  the  flesh, 
then  allowed  to  soak  and  ferment  a  day  or  so  to 
rot  away  the  slimy  substance  that  would  not  come 
off  in  the  pulping  process. 

After  thorough  washing  (formerly  by  trampling 
the  submerged  berries  with  bare  feet,  now  by 
agitating  them  mechanically),  the  water  is  drawn 
off,  and  a  number  of  rinsings  clear  away  the  scum, 
and  leave  the  berries  to  dry  in  their  bright  parch- 
ment hulls.  As  rain  and  dew  would  retard  the 
drying,  the  plan  is  to  cover  the  berries  when  the 
sun  is  gone.  Sliding  roofs  or  sliding  platforms, 
that  may  be  shoved  under  cover,  protect  the  dry- 
ing berries.  Artificial  heat  is  sometimes  used. 

Next,  the  berries  may  be  sacked  for  shipment, 


286  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

or  they  may  be  put  through  the  hulling  machine, 
that  removes  the  horny  covering.  This  is  the 
"peeling"  process.  The  winnowing  blows  away 
the  broken  hulls  and  the  silver  skins  that  are 
rubbed  off,  leaving  the  coffee  bean  as  it  comes  to 
us  in  the  unroasted  state. 

The  dry  process  takes  the  berries  from  the  pick- 
ers' baskets,  spreads  them  to  dry  on  stone  floors, 
where  they  are  raked  over  to  make  sure  all  are  dry 
before  they  are  stored  away.  When  needed,  they 
are  freed  by  pounding  from  the  coat  of  dried  flesh 
and  parchment  which  are  like  a  single  layer.  A 
hulling  machine  does  the  work  quickly,  and  is 
generally  taking  the  place  of  the  simple  mortars. 

The  final  preparation  of  coffee  berries  for  mar- 
ket is  the  sifting  out  of  broken  grains,  and  grading 
into  different  sizes.  This  is  done  by  the  use  of 
sieves  of  different  sized  mesh. 

Before  using,  the  berries  are  roasted  till  they 
turn  dark  brown,  then  ground  or  pulverized.  The 
hot  water  extracts  the  caffeine  and  a  volatile  oil 
in  which  resides  the  flavor  of  coffee.  The  stimu- 
lating and  refeshing  effect  of  the  caffeine  is 
harmful  to  some  people,  and  probably  to  all  who 
drink  much  of  this  beverage.  We  must  not  for- 
get that  coffee  is  a  much-abused  article  of  com- 
merce. It  is  subject  to  gross  adulteration,  and 


BEVERAGE    PLANTS  287 

even  the  pure  coffee  becomes  unfit  for  drinking  if 
boiled  a  long  time.  Boiling  brings  out  an  increas- 
ing quantity  of  the  caffeine,  which  is  injurious  to 
the  nervous  system. 

MATE,    OR   PARAGUAY    TEA 

Tea-drinking  of  an  entirely  new  kind  the  tra- 
veller meets  in  the  lower  half  of  South  America. 
At  first  the  bitter  taste,  and  the  unfamiliar  aro- 
matic taste,  of  the  universal  beverage  of  the  people 
are  not  at  all  to  his  liking.  But  if  he  sets  his  mind 
to  it,  a  liking  for  the  "yerba  de  mate"  grows  on 
him.  He  takes  it  with  pleasure  after  hours  of 
exercise,  and  finds  his  drooping  spirits  revived, 
his  tired  feeling  gone. 

The  plant  whose  leaves  are  used  in  making  this 
beverage  is  a  holly  that  grows  as  the  principal 
species  in  vast  forests  in  Paraguay  and  neighbor- 
ing countries.  A  few  plantations  of  the  tree  have 
been  set,  anticipating  a  possible  exhaustion  of  the 
native  supply.  The  branches  are  gathered  and 
dried  over  fires.  Then  the  leaves  are  beaten  off 
and  broken  or  ground  into  a  coarse  powder.  The 
highest  market  grade  of  the  dried  herb  comes 
from  the  youngest  leaves.  The  cheapest  grade  has 
twigs  and  leaf  stems  in  it. 


288  THE    BOOK    OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

Mate  is  brewed  by  pouring  hot  water  over  a 
pinch  of  the  tea  leaves  held  in  the  bottom  of  the 
cup  by  a  disk  of  wire  netting  to  keep  the  liquid 
clear  of  "grounds."  Sugar  is  added.  The  tea  is 
drunk  through  a  tube  used  as  we  do  a  straw  for 
lemonade.  But  there  is  a  perforated  bulb  at  the 
base  of  the  tube  that  strains  the  tea. 

PULQUE,   THE   BEVERAGE    OF  MEXICO 

The  century  plant  is  our  most  familiar  plant 
of  the  Agave  tribe.  In  the  dry  air  of  the  high- 
lands of  Mexico  these  fleshy-leaved,  robust  plants 
seem  to  draw  water  from  unknown  sources,  and 
store  it  in  their  bodies.  The  Mexican  digs  a 
hollow  in  the  central  stem,  usually  by  cutting  off 
the  flower  stalk,  and  goes  away.  He  returns  soon 
to  dip  out  the  accumulation  of  sweet  sap,  which  he 
calls  "agua  miel,"  sweet  water.  This  is  good  to 
drink.  But  after  it  ferments  he  likes  it  better. 
It  is  then  the  bad-smelling,  good-tasting  pulque 
the  universal  beverage  of  the  people.  Foreigners 
object  to  the  odor  of  spoiling  meat.  But  even  this 
^.does  not  long  keep  them  from  tasting,  and  really 
liking,  the  drink,  which  can  be  had  in  various 
stages  of  fermentation. 


Narcotic  Plants 


'CHAPTER  IX 

TOBACCO 

WHEN  Benzoni,  a  Spanish  explorer,  wrote  of  his 
travels  in  Mexico,  about  the  middle  of  the  six- 
teenth century,  he  described  plantations  of  an 
herb  the  natives  called  "tabacco,"  the  leaf  of 
which  was  dried  and  smoked  in  a  pipe.  Earlier 
in  the  same  fcentury,  the  islands  off  to  the  south- 
east of  Florida  were  explored  by  the  followers  of 
Columbus,  and  here  tobacco  was  seen  first  by 
civilized  men.  The  natives  dried  the  leaves,  then 
made  a  little  bonfire  of  them  in  an  open  vessel, 
and  sat  down  before  it  to  inhale  the  smoke,  which 
gave  them  a  pleasant  sensation  of  physical  com- 
fort. The  tool  they  used  was  a  hollow  tube  that 
branched  near  one  end.  One  arm  of  the  Y  was 
inserted  in  each  nostril,  and  the  other  end  of  the 
"pipe"  was  held  where  it  caught  the  smoke,  close 
to  the  smouldering  leaves. 

The  North  American  Indians  used  a  pipe  much 
like  those  we  see  to-day,  and  inhaled  the  smoke 
through  the  mouth.  The  Y-shaped  pipe,  first 

291 


292  THE   BOOK  OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

seen  on  the  island  of  San  Domingo,  was  called 
"  tabaco. "  So  there  is  little  doubt  that  this  funny 
little  nose-pipe  gave  its  name  to  the  plant,  which 
has  spread  from  its  native  land,  America,  to  the 
principal  countries  of  the  Old  World. 

Of  course  the  Spaniards  tried  the  novelty,  and 
soon  learned  to  like  the  taste  and  smell  of  the 
narcotic  plant.  They  introduced  it  in  Spain,  and 
the  French  ambassador  to  Spain  took  a  plant 
home  with  him,  and  presented  it  to  the  king  and 
queen.  Other  plants  were  sent  by  him  to  set  out 
in  the  royal  gardens  in  Paris,  where  the  great 
reputation  of  the  newcomer  rested  on  its  medici- 
nal properties.  Famous  Spanish  physicians  had 
hailed  the  tobacco  plant  as  a  cure  for  many 
diseases,  and  it  was  called  "the  holy  herb,"  and 
"herba  panacea,"  the  cure-all. 

The  name  of  Nicot,  the  ambassador  to  Spain, 
was  given  to  the  tobacco  plant  by  the  botanist 
Linnaeus,  who  named  it  Nicotiana  Tabacum. 
The  drug,  nicotine,  contained  in  the  sap  of  the 
whole  plant,  is  very  poisonous.  It  must  be  remem- 
bered that  tobacco  belongs  in  the  Nightshade 
Family,  which  has  a  number  of  poisonous  plants 
in  it. 

Fifty  different  plants  of  the  genus  Nicotiana  are 
known.  The  tobacco  of  the  world  comes  chiefly 


NARCOTIC    PLANTS  293 

from  varieties  of  the  single  species,  which  was 
carried  from  America  to  Europe,  and  thence  spread 
to  the  other  parts  of  the  world  where  the  plant  is 
a  commercial  crop.  Some  of  the  best  of  foreign 
tobaccos  are  from  seed  of  varieties  developed  in 
sections  of  the  United  States. 

Tobacco  is  a  tall,  broad-leaved  plant,  with  a 
central  stalk  that  bears,  at  maturity,  a  branching, 
loose  cluster  of  pink  or  rose-colored  flowers,  with 
funnel-shaped  corollas,  each  drawn  out  into  five 
points.  The  seeds  are  so  small  that  a  great  number 
are  packed  ifito  the  pod  that  matures  in  the  clasp- 
ing, green  calyx  at  the  base  of  the  funnel.  An 
ounce  contains  over  300,000  seeds!  But  a  small 
proportion  of  them  are  able  to  sprout,  and  those 
which  are  "viable"  have  such  hard  shells  that  the 
little  plants  have  the  hardest  work  to  get  out. 
It  is  a  common  practice  to  rub  the  seeds  gently  in 
the  hands  with  powdered  emery  to  bruise  the  coat 
and  thus  ease  the  sprouting  process. 

The  seedlings  are  raised  in  a  specially  prepared 
seed  bed,  and  transplanted  to  the  field  when  about 
four  to  six  inches  high.  They  are  set,  by  good 
growers,  three  or  four  feet  apart,  so  that  the  culti- 
vator can  run  through  between  the  rows  in  both 
directions.  Clean  culture,  but  shallow,  kills  the 
weeds  and  saves  the  soil  moisture  for  the  feeding 


294      THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

roots.  When  the  top  is  about  to  blossom  it  is 
removed,  to  throw  the  energies  of  the  plant  into 
leaf-making.  Side  shoots  are  removed  as  they 
appear,  for  the  same  reason.  When  the  leaves 
are  sticky,  and  show  yellow  when  held  before  the 
sun,  they  are  ready  to  harvest.  They  break  easily 
^hen  bent. 

Harvesting  methods  differ,  but  the  operations 
include  cutting,  drying,  sweating,  and  packing  the 
leaves.  Kentucky  harvests  a  tremendous  crop, 
the  biggest  of  all  the  tobacco  states.  Wisconsin 
and  Massachusetts  are  the  northernmost  tobacco 
states.  Florida  grows  special  grades  of  fine,  to- 
bacco. So  does  Connecticut.  Louisiana  grows  a 
famous  kind. 

The  great  tobacco  producing  countries  of 
Europe  are  Germany,  Russia,  and  Hungary. 
India,  Samatra  and  Java,  Turkey,  Japan  and 
China  are  the  Asiatic  countries.  Cuba  and  Porto 
Rico,  Mexico  and  Argentina  are  the  tropical 
American  tobacco  regions,  and  Argentina  and 
Brazil  are  great  tobacco  countries  in  the  South 
Temperate  Zone.  The  industry  is  growing  in 
Africa  and  the  Philippines.  A  million  tons  are 
sent  to  market  yearly  from  all  the  plantations  of 
the  world. 

The  quieting  of  nerves,  and  a  general  feeling  of 


NARCOTIC   PLANTS  295 

bodily  comfort  are  the  benefits  enjoyed  by  the 
smoker  of  tobacco.  The  nicotine,  he  claims,  is 
dissipated  in  the  burning  of  the  tobacco,  but  he 
concedes  that  other  poisons  are  developed  in  the 
smoke.  The  damage  to  the  heart  and  other  organs 
of  some  smokers  is  traceable  directly  to  the  nar- 
cotic of  tobacco.  Nerves  of  other  people  are  worn 
to  a  state  of  prostration.  Because  the  effects  of 
tobacco  are  not  alike  in  different  people,  the  user 
of  the  "weed"  is  very  likely  to  blame  the  bread 
he  eats,  as  soon  as  the  pipe  he  smokes,  for  ill  health. 
All  agree  that  the  moderate  smoker  is  far  better 
off  than  the  immoderate  one.  And  there  are  no 
two  sides  to  the  question  of  the  injury  boys  suffer 
from  the  use  of  tobacco. 

Chewing  tobacco  and  snuff-taking  were  habits 
learned  by  the  early  Spanish  explorers  from 
Indians  in  the  West  Indies  and  South  America. 
Snuff  is  a  compound  of  powdered  tobacco,  which  is 
inhaled,  a  pinch  at  a  time,  for  the  "titillating  joy" 
it  gives  the  lining  membrane  of  the  nose.  The 
snuff-taking  of  the  aristocrats  of  the  eighteenth 
century  was  a  dainty  performance,  Snuff-dip- 
ping as  practised  now  by  the  "cracker"  of  the 
South  is  disgusting.  And  the  sources  of  the  ma- 
terial out  of  which  cheap  snuff  is  made  are  un- 
speakable. Chewing  tobacco  is  a  habit  no  one 


296  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

can  practise  to-day  and  retain  his  self-respect. 
It  is  not  tolerated  in  respectable  society  in  this 
country,  which  demands  that  a  gentleman  smoke 
his  tobacco,  or  go  without  it. 

* 

POPPY 

«r 

The  drug,  morphine,  is  extracted  from  the  dried 
juice,  called  opium,  of  the  poppy,  cultivated 
extensively  in  eastern  countries.  The  pod  that 
contains  the  seeds  is  pierced  while  still  green,  and 
the  milky  juice  that  exudes  is  allowed  to  dry  over- 
night, when  it  is  collected.  Hand  labor  makes 
poppy  culture  a  slow,  primitive  business.  But  the 
Indian  government  has  built  up  a  vast  industry 
through  its  monopoly  of  the  growing  of  this  plant 
and  the  export  of  opium  to  China.  The  Chinese 
are  opium-eaters  (or  smokers)  to  such  a  degree  that 
their  rulers  have  become  frightened,  and  have 
tried  to  stop  the  importation  of  the  drug,  in  hope 
of  checking  the  habit.  The  British  and  the  local 
officials  have  worked  against  the  success  of  this 
wise  plan,  causing  repeated  failures,  until  recent 
years.  Now  the  importation  of  opium  is  lessened, 
and  China  is  throwing  off  the  deadly  drug. 

The  effect  of  opium  is  first  exciting,  then  drowsi- 
ness ensues.  Small  doses  ease  pain,  and  give  a 


NARCOTIC   PLANTS  297 

sense  of  comfort.  Big  doses  produce  deep  sleep, 
then  coma  and  death.  Opium-eaters  are  slaves 
to  a  terrible  habit  they  cannot  break.  They  are 
useless  to  themselves  and  to  their  fellows. 

Morphine  is  used  by  physicians  to  allay  acute 
suffering  and  to  bring  sleep  when  natural  sleep  is 
impossible.  They  use  it  with  extreme  caution  and 
sparingly,  as  a  last  resort,  knowing  the  danger. 
It  is  administered  through  the  mouth  or  by  means 
of  the  hypodermic  needle  directly  into  the  blood,  j 

Codein  is  another  drug  derived  from  opium. 
It  produces  effects  like  those  of  morphine,  but 
it  is  not  so  powerful. 

BETEL   NUTS 

The  natives  of  the  Malay  Peninsula  and  neigh- 
boring islands  are  addicted  to  the  habit  of  chewing 
betel  nuts,  the  seeds  of  the  Areca  palm.  The 
fruit  is  the  size  of  a  hen's  egg.  Inside  the  fibrous 
husk  is  the  nut,  which  is  sliced  and  wrapped  in  the 
leaves  of  a  peppery  plant.  The  saliva  of  the 
chewer  turns  red  and  flows  freely,  owing  to  the  hot 
and  bitter  taste  of  the  substance.  The  effect  is 
at  first  stimulating,  then  stupefying  to  the  senses. 
Moreover,  the  habit  is  one  that  cannot  be  thrown 
off.  The  teeth  gradually  turn  black,  and  decay. 


298  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

Often  a  victim  of  this  practice  is  toothless  at 
twenty-five  years  from  it.  Ceylon  exports  half 
a  million  dollars'  worth  of  these  nuts  annually. 

The  gum-chewing  habit  seen  so  much  in  this 
country  is  less  defensible  among  our  intelligent 
people  than  the  betel-chewing  of  the  dark-skinned 
natives  of  the  East  Indies.  They  have  less  knowl- 
edge of  the  proper  care  of  a  healthy  body,  and  no 
higher  standards  to  judge  their  habits  by  than 
those  inherited  from  half-civilized  parents 

COCA 

A  wonderful  power  of  resisting  mental  or  bodily 
weariness  is  imparted  to  the  person  who  chews  the 
leaves  of  the  coca  shrub,  that  grows  wild  in  the 
Andean  valleys  of  Bolivia  and  Peru.  The  dried 
leaves,  mixed  with  quicklime,  are  chewed  by  all 
the  natives  of  the  region,  and  quantities  are  ex- 
ported, for  it  is  from  these  leaves  that  the  drug, 
cocaine,  is  extracted.  This  is  used  in  dentistry, 
to  produce  insensibility  to  pain  over  a  small  area, 
and  for  a  short  time.  The  habit  of  chewing  coca 
leaves  is  an  ancient  one.  The  Indians  cannot  get 
on  without  this  stimulating  drug.  The  habit  of 
taking  cocaine  is  a  recent  one  among  civilized 
people,  and  though  the  results  are  soothing,  the 


NARCOTIC    PLANTS  299 

intoxication  being  somewhat  like  that  induced  by 
opium,  the  habit  is  dangerous  in  the  extreme. 
Slaves  to  the  coca  or  cocaine  habit  are  short-lived. 

Do  not  confute  the  shrub  coca,  with  the  useful 
coco-nut,  a  palm,  nor  the  cacao  tree,  from  whose 
seeds  cocoa  and  chocolate  are  made. 

The  Cola,  or  Kola,  is  a  tropical  African  tree, 
whose  fleshy  nuts,  like  horse-chestnuts,  have  much 
the  same  effect  on*  the  nerves  as  the  leaves  of  the 
coca.  The  two  are  combined  in  a  summer 
beverage  that  physicians  condemn,  knowing  the 
two  drugs  it  contains,  and  the  billboards  extol  as 
harmless  and  delightful. 


Fibre  Plants 


CHAPTER  X 
FLAX 

FLAX 'is  the  oldest  of  cultivated  fibre  plants, 
and,  until  the  growing  of  cotton  became  the  great 
agricultural  industry  of  the  South,  it  was  the  most 
important  of  the  world's  fibre  crops.  Only  within 
the  last  century  has  flax  surrendered  first  place  to 
cotton,  though  both  plants  have  furnished  clothing 
to  civilized  man  ever  since  he  began  to  demand 
something  different  from  the  skins  of  wild  beasts. 
Cotton  has  the  advantage  of  being  cheaper  than 
flax  to  raise  and  to  prepare  for  weaving  into  cloth. 

Wild  flax  probably  grew  on  the  hillsides  of  As- 
syria and  in  the  Nile  Valley  before  it  was  brought 
into  cultivation.  Nowhere  does  it  grow  in  a  wild 
state  to-day,  unless  we  count  the  roadside  flax 
escaped  from  fields.  It  was  grown  and  cloth 
woven  of  its  fibres,  in  ancient  times,  as  the  earliest 
records  prove.  The  mummies  of  early  Egyptian 
tombs  were  wrapped  in  linen  cerements,  and  the 
flax  plant  was  carved  on  the  tombs.  The  Bible 
describes  the  royal  splendor  of  kings,  clothed  in 

303 


304  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

purple  and  fine  linen.  The  strength  and  durability 
of  the  fabric,  whether  coarse  or  fine,  and  the  snowy 
whiteness  and  silky  lustre  of  the  cloth  when 
bleached,  established  flax  as  the  finest  fibre  crop  in 
the  agricultural  countries  of  the  world. 

The  Lake-dwellers  of  Switzerland,  who  repre- 
sent the  Stone  Age,  grew  the  plant  for  its  fibre, 
which  they  wove  into  cloth.  The  household  in- 
dustries have  brought  the  growing,  spinning,  and 
weaving  of  flax  down  to  the  time  when  machinery 
relieved  human  hands  of  much  of  the  labor  in- 
volved. But  machines  have  not  made  better  nor 
finer  linen  than  the  old-time  hand  looms  produced. 

A  large  part  of  the  difference  in  cost  between 
cotton  and  linen  is  due  to  the  fact  that  machinery 
has  not  yet  taken  much  work  away  from  the  hand- 
laborer  in  linen  manufacture.  Cotton  machinery, 
from  the  newly  introduced  pickers,  and  the  gins, 
to  all  the  mill  machinery,  is  a  perfect  system  that 
makes  the  machinery  used  in  handling  flax  look 
crude  indeed.  And  it  is  crude. 

Flax  is  a  delicate,  branched  plant,  two  or  three 
feet  high,  with  narrow,  long  leaves,  set  opposite, 
and  numerous  pale  blue  flowers,  followed  by  globu- 
lar capsules,  each  five-chambered,  with  two  seeds 
in  each  chamber.  The  shiny,  slippery,  brown 
seeds  are  kept  by  every  druggist.  They  are  in 


FIBRE    PLANTS  305 

demand  to  make  flaxseed  poultices.  A  single  seed 
dropped  into  the  eye  will  invariably  capture  the 
cinder  that  no  other  means  has  been  able  to  re- 
move. The  gum  that  coats  the  seed  swells  when 
wet  so  that  a  poultice  takes  up  four  times  as  much 
space  as  the  dry  seeds  did.  More  commonly,  the 
meal  is  used,  cooked  to  a  mush,  and  applied  as 
hot  as  can  be  borne  to  painful  swellings,  which  it 
relieves  by  keeping  moist  and  warm. 

The  growing  of  flax  in  America  to-day  is  chiefly 
for  its  seed;  the  making  of  linen  from  the  fibre  is 
not  yet  profitable.  The  farmer  threshes  his  flax, 
and  sells  the  seed  to  his  local  grain  merchant,  who 
sells  it  to  the  jobber,  who  sends  it  to  the  linseed 
mill.  Here  the  seed  is  cleaned  of  weed  seeds  and 
refuse  by  screening  and  fanning  machines;  then  it 
passes  through  a  series  of  rollers  that  reduce  it  to 
a  pasty  mass  of  meal.  Now  the  meal  is  put  into 
camel's  hair  bags,  and  moulded  into  cakes,  that 
are  heated  to  near  200°  F.,  then  brought  under 
pressure  that  extracts  the  oil,  leaving  "oil  cake. " 

The  oil  is  drawn  off  and  refined,  after  which  it  is 
ready  for  market.  Oil  cake  is  ground  into  oil 
meal,  and  sold  for  stock  food.  "Linseed"  oil  is 
used  in  the  manufacture  of  the  best  grades  of 
paint,  and  for  a  multitude  of  other  purposes,  includ- 
ing the  making  of  patent-leather  shoes. 


306  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

The  Dakota  farmer  may  sell  his  flax  straw  as  it 
comes,  broken  and  tangled,  out  of  the  thresher,  to 
the  tow  mill,  where  it  is  made  into  stuffing  for 
cheap  mattresses,  upholstered  furniture,  padding 
for  refrigerator  cars  and  cold  storage  warehouses, 
ice  boxes  and  the  like,  or  spun  into  binding  twine. 
.The  highest  grades  of  linen  made  in  America  at  a 
profit  are  coarse  crash  towelling,  carpet  yarns, 
and  fish  seines. 

THE    GROWING   OF   FLAX 

Homespun  linen  clothed  our  ancestors  until 
they  could  no  longer  afford  to  keep  the  industry 
going.  Labor  is  high-priced,  so  Americans  buy 
their  linens  abroad,  where  labor  is  still  cheap. 
The  improvement  of  machinery  to  handle  flax 
may  soon  make  it  a  profitable  industry  in  this 
country.  Students  of  the  problem  believe  the 
time  is  coming  when  we  shall  make  our  own 
table  linens. 

The  growing  of  flax  is  an  exacting  business. 
The  best  soil  is  a  heavy,  rich,  well-drained  loam 
that  has  borne  crops  that  require  clean  culture. 
This  means  that  the  weeds  are  under  control. 
On  this  soil,  finely  mellowed,  and  lightly  rolled, 
the  seed  is  sown  broadcast,  by  hand,  and  har- 


FIBRE    PLANTS  307 

rowed  with  a  tool  of  many  teeth,  to  cover.  In 
Europe  the  field  is  rolled  when  the  seeds  sprout, 
and  when  the  flax  plants  are  two  inches  high  they 
get  a  careful  hand-weeding.  This  work  is  done 
by  women  and  boys,  who  kneel  at  their  work. 
Sometimes  two  or  three  weedings  are  necessary. 
The  earlier  the  sowing,  the  better  the  fibre,  if  early 
frosts  do  not  catch  the  crop. 

"June  makes  the  flax,"  they  say.  Then  or 
never  the  stems  lengthen,  and  the  three  months  of 
growth  end^  in  flowers  and  seed  capsules.  When 
the  lower  leaves  droop,  and  the  pods  are  turning 
to  yellow,  the  men  go  out  to  pull  the  flax.  Hand- 
fuls  are  pulled  up,  laid  with  even  roots  on  the 
ground,  after  the  dirt  is  shaken  out,  and  all  weeds 
discarded.  Bundle  is  laid  across  bundle  to  let  in 
air.  So  the  field  is  harvested,  and  the  dry  stems 
prepared  for  stacking  or  retting. 

The  seeds  are  "in  the  dough"  when  the  straw 
is  in  best  condition  to  make  linen.  But  even  these 
unripe  seeds  must  be  removed.  Hand  labor  again. 
The  worker  takes  a  handful  at  a  time,  and  draws 
the  heads  through  a  rude  stationary  comb;  the 
capsules  roll  off  as  they  are  drawn  through  the 
teeth. 

"Retting"  is  the  process  that  separates  the  fibre 
in  the  bark  of  the  flax  stem  from  the  gummy  sub- 


308  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

stance  and  the  woody  tissues.  It  may  be  done 
chemically  in  a  short  time,  but  that  injures  the 
fabric.  "Dew-retting"  is  laying  the  straw  on  the 
grass  and  letting  the  rain  and  dew  rot  away  the 
parts  that  support  the  soft,  strong  threads.  It 
takes  weeks  for  this  method  of  retting,  and  the 
fibres  are  stained  by  uneven  contact  with  the  earth 
and  sun. 

"Pool-retting"  is  submerging  the  bundles  of 
straw  in  natural  or  made  pools  of  soft  water  until 
the  fibres  are  freed  by  fermentation. 

"River-retting"  substitutes  running  water  for 
stagnant.  The  most  perfect  place  for  this  process 
yet  found  is  a  stretch  of  several  miles  near  Cour- 
trai,  in  Belgium,  in  the  bed  of  the  River  Lys.  Its 
murky  waters  barely  creep  along  over  a  bottom  of 
blue  clay.  Flemish  flax-growers  draw  their  heavy 
loads  of  straw  to  the  river,  pack  their  crates,  and 
wait  their  turn  to  push  off  these  precious  loads 
into  the  river.  Each  crate  is  covered  with  a 
protecting  layer  of  rye  straw  and  properly  bal- 
lasted with  stones  so  that  the  flax  will  all  be  under 
water.  When  the  process  of  retting  is  complete, 
a  crane  raises  the  crate,  the  straw  is  spread  on  the 
grass  till  thoroughly  dried,  then  carried  away. 

Flax  retted  in  the  "Golden  Lys"  is  soft  and 
silky,  and  finer  than  any  retted  elsewhere.  Just 


FIBRE    PLANTS  309 

why,  nobody  knows  with  certainty.  Pools  lined 
with  blue  clay  do  better  than  others  not  so  lined. 
It  may  be  that  the  clay  does  it. 

The  dry  straw  is  next  broken  by  passing  through 
corrugated  rollers.  The  result  is  that  bits  of  woody 
substance  from  the  stem  fall  off  in  the  "scutching," 
or  combing,  and  shaking  that  follows.  Tow  is  the 
name  given  the  combings  of  the  scutching  tool. 
Next,  the  "hackling"  does  the  thorough  combing 
that  removes  snarls  in  the  fibres,  and  gets  rid  of 
any  "shives"  (woody  particles)  the  scutching 
missed.  The  skeins  of  flax  are  ready  to  be  baled 
and  sent  to  the  mills  for  weaving  into  cloth,  or 
spinning  into  yarn. 

A  single  fibre  of  flax  may  be  over  a  foot  in 
length.  Though  one  of  the  finest  of  fibres,  it  is 
stronger  than  that  of  any  other  textile  plant. 
These  facts  explain  the  strength  and  the  filmy 
sheerness  we  see  combined  in  some  handkerchief 
linens,  and  their  durability. 

Nobody  can  fully  appreciate  the  beauty  of  the 
flax  flower  until  he  has  grown  a  plot  of  it.  "Blue 
were  her  eyes  as  the  fairy  flax,"  wrote  the  poet  of 
the  skipper's  little  daughter,  in  "The  Wreck  of 
the  Hesperus."  Our  flax  flowers  are  a  color  we 
can't  forget.  We  can  easily  follow  the  steps  by 
which  flax  is  prepared  for  spinning,  and  do  by 


3IO  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

hand,  or  with  tools  we  make,  the  retting,  breaking, 
scutching,  and  heckling. 

Choose  the  longest  fibre  in  the  skein  of  your  own 
making.  Stretch  it  taut.  The  English  word, 
"line,"  originally  meant  "a  thread  of  flax," 
whose  Latin  name  is  Linum.  A  dozen  words 
come  from  this  old  root:  the  German  lein,  French 
lin,  Celtic  llin,  Swiss  linie.  The  English  words 
lint,  liniment,  linseed  are  from  the  same  root.  I 
fancy  that  lin,  a  pool  or  brook,  came  from  the  use 
made  of  these  in  the  retting  of  flax. 

COTTON 

Dixie-land  is  the  land  of  cotton.  Draw  a  line 
on  the  map  from  the  mouth  of  the  James  River,  at 
Norfolk,  Virginia,  west  to  Cairo,  Illinois,  and  on 
through  Memphis,  and  Little  Rock  to  Dallas, 
Texas.  Below  it  lies  the  region  of  profitable  cot- 
ton culture  of  the  United  States.  "The  Cotton 
Belt"  occupies  the  southeastern  quarter  of  our 
country,  touching  the  Atlantic  and  the  Gulf,  and 
reaching  nearly  to  the  western  boundary  of  Texas. 
Only  the  lower  half  of  Florida  and  the  delta  of  the 
Mississippi  are  left  out,  and  they  are  offset  by  a 
cotton  region  in  the  new  West  that  centres  at 
the  point  where  Utah,  Nevada,  and  Arizona  meet. 


FIBRE    PLANTS  311 

"Of  the  17,782,440  bales  making  up  the  1904-5 
cotton  crop  of  the  world,  the  United  States  grew 
13,420,440  bales."  If  Mr.  C.  W.  Burkett,  author 
of  the  great  book,  "  Cotton, "  is  sure  of  his  figures, 
we  see  that  the  United  States  grew  in  that  year 
three  times  as  much  cotton  as  all  other  countries 
put  together.  Cotton  is  the  principal  crop  in  ten 
states  of  the  South.  Yet  the  industry  is  capable 
of  wonderful  expansion,  and  the  next  half  century 
will  see  the  cotton  yield  doubled  without  extend- 
ing the  territory.  Only  one  acre  in  seventeen  in 
the  Cotton  Belt  now  grows  cotton.  The  average 
yield  is  less  than  two  hundred  pounds  of  "lint," 
or  fibre,  per  acre.  Many  large  cotton  plantations, 
under  careful  cultivation,  average  500  to  800 
pounds  of  lint  per  acre.  The  primitive  methods  of 
growing  cotton  must  be  reformed;  then  the  yield 
will  keep  pace  with  the  growing  demand  for  more 
that  comes  from  the  mills  and  factories.  More 
land  can  be  planted  to  cotton,  when  the  world 
needs  more  than  good  farming  can  produce  on  the 
present  acreage.  The  supremacy  of  our  country 
as  the  producer  of  cotton  will  never  be  taken  away. 
This  is  the  opinion  of  the  best  authorities  in  this 
and  other  parts  of  the  world. 

The  reason  we  are  confident  that  more  cotton 
will  soon  be  needed  is  that  civilization  is  opening 


312       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

doors  and  entering  regions  that  have  until  now 
had  no  contact  with  the  world  outside.  Savage 
peoples  are  receiving  strange  visitors  from  over 
seas,  whether  they  wish  to  or  not.  Africa,  the 
dark  continent,  and  China,  with  its  millions  of 
inhabitants,  have  been  thrown  open  recently. 

"It  is  estimated  that  of  the  world's  population 
of  1,500,000,000,  about  500,000,000  regularly 
wear  clothes,  about  750,000,000  are  partially 
clothed,  and  250,000,000  habitually  go  almost 
naked.  To  clothe  the  entire  population  of  the 
world  would  require  to-day  42,000,000  bales  of 
cotton,  of  500  pounds  each.  It  therefore  seems 
likely  that  the  cotton  industry  will  go  on  expand- 
ing until  the  whole  of  the  inhabited  earth  is 
clothed  with  the  products  of  its  looms."  The 
cotton  experts  of  the  Department  of  Agriculture 
at  Washington  thus  reason  and  predict  the  need 
and  the  means  of  its  fulfilment. 

The  fibre  that  clothes  the  multitudes  must  not 
only  be  strong  and  soft  and  flexible;  it  must  be 
cheap.  Cotton  is  all  of  these.  Cotton  imitates 
the  silkiness  of  silk,  the  wooliness  of  wool,  the 
strength  and  sheen  of  fine  linen.  It  is  all  things 
to  all  men.  We  know  it  in  a  half  a  hundred  forms 
in  our  homes  —  this  useful,  beautiful  fibre.  We 
wake  in  the  morning,  and  see  the  sunrise  through 


FIBRE    PLANTS  313 

parted  curtains  of  muslin.  These  and  the  roller 
shade  at  the  window  are  both  cotton.  The  sheets, 
pillow  cases,  mattress,  and  coverlid  are  cotton. 
Turkish  towels  and  bath  rug  are  cotton.  After 
our  bath  we  dress  in  clothes  of  cotton,  if  the  season 
permits.  In  the  coldest  winters  we  wear  some 
garments  of  cotton.  Our  buttons  are  sewed  on 
with  cotton  thread.  Through  the  day  we  see  and 
use  cotton  fabrics.  Towels,  tablecloths,  and 
napkins  are^of  linen,  but  rarely  is  it  in  common 
use  in  other  ways  in  our  day.  It  costs  too  much. 

Cotton  cloth  is  prosaic  and  coarse  in  the  calicoes 
and  muslins  of  the  ordinary  kinds.  But  some  of 
the  muslins  of  India  were  of  cobweb  fineness  — 
"webs  of  woven  wind,"  the  poet  has  called  them. 
The  Hindoos  two  thousand  years  ago  were  produc- 
ing, on  their  simple  looms,  fabrics  whose  fineness 
cannot  be  exceeded  by  the  best  modern  looms. 
Exquisite  cotton  fabrics,  dyed  in  many  harmon- 
ious colors,  were  sent  from  Mexico  to  the  Spanish 
monarch  by  Cortez,  who  rifled  the  treasures  of  the 
Aztecs. 

The  cotton  plant  belongs  to  the  Mallow 
Family,  along  with  the  hollyhock,  hibiscus,  althea, 
okra  and  the  little  weed  we  call  "cheeses."  The 
flowers  plainly  proclaim  the  relationship  of  these 
cousins.  The  trumpet-like  corolla  has  a  belt  of 


314  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

stamens,  all  grown  together  by  the  fleshiness  of 
their  filaments  that  form  a  cylinder  enclosing  the 
pistils.  The  abutilon,  or  flowering  maple,  grown 
indoors,  illustrates  well  this  mallow  type  of  flower. 
The  fruit  is  a  pod,  with  several  compartments 
containing  seeds.  In  the  cotton  plant,  the  seeds 
are  provided  with  long  hairs,  as  a  milkweed  seed  is. 
Nature  evidently  intended  these  hairs  to  aid  in 
scattering  the  seed.  The  pod  bursts  open  when 
ripe,  and  the  hairy  mass  is  pushed  out  by  its  own 
expansion.  The  seeds  go  wherever  the  "wool" 
goes. 

In  growing  cotton,  the  planting  day  waits  until 
danger  of  frost  is  about  past,  and  yet  the  planter 
must  beware  the  early  fall  frosts  that  might  get 
his  cotton  at  the  other  end  of  the  season.  Six 
months  of  growing  weather,  warm,  with  showers 
enough  and  plenty  of  sunshine,  the  cotton  plant 
requires  to  do  its  best. 

The  seed  is  put  into  the  ground,  in  a  continuous 
row,  like  peas,  though  single  plants  two  feet  apart 
is  the  ideal  "stand"  on  good  land.  The  little 
plants  come  up  slowly,  and  pretty  feeble  they  are, 
crowding  each  other  for  standing  room.  When 
they  are  a  few  inches  high  the  strongest  begin  to 
assert  themselves,  and  the  "choppers"  come  in 
with  hoes  to  thin  the  plants,  and  destroy,  with 


FIBRE    PLANTS  315 

other  weeds,  all  plants  but  the  few  that  are  chosen 
to  make  the  crop. 

Next  comes  the  cultivator,  with  the  important 
duty  of  stirring  ,the  surface  soil,  thus  killing  the 
young  weeds  and  grass.  Unhappily,  the  ignorant 
cotton-grower  goes  too  deep  and  too  close  with  his 
one-horse  plow,  which  cuts  off  side  roots,  and  so 
gives  the  plant  a  great  backset.  It  is  the  same 
plow  he  used  in  the  preparation  of  the  field  for 
the  seed,  and  is  utterly  unfit  for  the  tilling  of  a 
growing  crof>.  Besides  he  must  make  two  trips 
to  do  a  single  row. 

It  is  a  pathetic  sight  to  see  farmers  damaging 
their  crop  with  labor  that  is  so  hard,  when  a  tool 
suited  to  the  job  would  save  half  the  effort  and 
double  the  yield  of  the  land. 

Every  week  or  ten  days  the  cultivation  of  the 
rows  is  needed  to  check  the  weeds  and  grass,  and 
to  keep  the  soil  moisture  from  being  lost  by  evapo- 
ration. The  roots  are  gathering  their  food  from 
the  soil  moisture,  and  need  all  they  can  get. 

Rains  by  night  and  hot  sunshine  by  day  bring 
the  cotton  plant  up  fast,  send  out  side  branches, 
heavy  with  leaves,  and  on  these  branches  the  buds. 
The  flowers  open,  white  or  yellowish,  and  close  at 
nightfall.  The  second  day  they  open  and  be- 
come reddish.  On  the  third  day  the  blossoms  fall, 


3l6      THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

leaving  behind  the  little  pointed  bolls  with  the 
green  calyx  to  protect  each.  Gradually  the  boll 
grows  until  it  reaches  the  size  of  a  hen's  egg. 
Then  it  cracks  along  three  division  lines,  showing 
white  fibres  that  hide  the  seed.  In  a  little  while 
the  picker  comes  to  pull  the  fibrous  mass  out  of  the 
pod,  and  the  story  is  ended. 

Not  all  of  the  bolls  ripen  together  on  a  plant. 
Indeed,  it  would  be  a  simple  job  to  invent  har- 
vesters for  cotton  as  for  corn.  But  the  bolls  ripen 
gradually  through  a  period  of  three  months.  The 
colored  race  loves  the  cotton,  and  furnishes  the 
pickers.  Families  leave  the  cities  and  swarm  to 
the  fields,  singing  the  songs  of  their  people,  revel- 
ling in  the  freedom  and  the  beauty  of  the  country, 
while  they  work  (not  too  hard!)  and  earn  money 
against  the  coming  of  winter.  The  picking  costs 
two  cents  per  pound  of  lint.  The  farmers  of  the 
South  paid  out  $75,000,000  for  the  picking  of  the 
cotton  crop  of  1905! 

The  pickers'  bags  are  weighed  as  they  are  emp- 
tied, and  the  seed  cotton  goes  by  the  wagon- 
load  to  the  gin. 

The  cotton  gin  is  the  machine  that  separates 
seeds  from  lint.  Until  1792,  when  Eli  Whitney 
invented  this  wonderful  machine,  the  seeds  had 
to  be  picked  by  hand  out  of  the  fibre  —  a  toil- 


FIBRE    PLANTS  317 

some,  slow  process.  The  gin  revolutionized  the 
whole  cotton  industry  of  the  world.  Inventions 
had  just  supplied  machinery  to  take  the  place 
of  hands  in  the  spinning  and  weaving  of  cloth. 
The  gin  made  it  possible  for  the  cotton-growers 
to  supply  the  increased  demand  for  lint.  It 
bridged  a  chasm  about  which  men  had  been 
hopeless: 

The  gin  to-day  is  an  improved  machine,  com- 
pared with  Vifhitney's.  But  it  does  the  work  on 
the  same  principle.  The  freed  lint  is  compressed 
into  bales  that  may  be  marketed  at  once,  or  kept 
for  sale  later. 

The  best  fibre  is  the  longest  and  finest  and 
strongest  one.  Sea  Island  cotton  has  highest 
rank.  Its  fibre  averages  1.61  inches  in  length, 
and  is  fine  and  silky.  A  pound  of  these  fibres 
could  be  spun  into  a  thread  160  miles  long!  Un- 
fortunately, this  variety  grows  only  on  the  coast 
of  South  Carolina,  Georgia,  and  Florida,  and  the 
islands  of  that  region.  So  the  amount  produced 
makes  little  impression  upon  the  market. 

The  hairy  upland  cotton,  with  short  fibre,  is  the 
common  crop  of  the  Cotton  Belt.  Its  "staple" 
is  less  than  an  inch  in  length,  and  correspond- 
ingly thicker  than  that  of  the  Sea  Island.  Of  this 
prevailing  species,  a  number  of  varieties  have  been 


318  THE   BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

developed,  adapted  to  different  situations,  soils, 
and  other  conditions. 

Attempts  have  been  made  to  lengthen  the  fibre 
by  seed  selection,  cultivation,  fertilizing,  and  by 
hybridizing.  These  efforts  have  already  improved 
the  quality  of  the  different  varieties,  and  it  is  but 
a  short  time  since  they  were  begun.  The  future 
will  carry  the  work  forward  much  more  quickly, 
for  the  Government  experts  are  teaching  the 
farmers  how  to  use  improved  methods  in  all  phases 
of  cotton  culture. 

India  has  two  native  species  of  cotton,  one  a 
tree,  the  other  a  bush.  The  latter  is  the  field 
cotton  of  India,  inferior  to  our  upland  species  in 
size  of  boll  and  length  of  staple.  Tree  cotton  is 
not  grown  as  a  field  crop  anywhere. 

Seed  cotton  is  one  third  lint  and  two  thirds  seed. 
The  gin  separates  the  two.  The  farmer  loads  his 
crop  into  the  wagon  and  drives  to  the  gin.  Here 
a  suction  elevator  conveys  the  load  to  the  gin, 
which  drops  the  seed  below,  and  blows  the  lint 
away  to  a  receiving  place,  the  lint  room,  from 
which  the  compresses  bale  it  into  a  dense  package, 
covered  and  roped  for  storage  or  shipment.  The 
modern  cotton  bale  weighs  about  500  pounds.  Its 
destiny  is  the  mill,  where  the  lint  is  spun  and 
woven  into  cloth. 


FIBRE    PLANTS  319 

Until  a  few  years  ago  the  cotton  seed  was  an 
accumulation  of  waste,  that  the  gin-owners  had 
trouble  to  dispose  of.  They  built  their  gins  over 
streams,  so  that  the  current  would  carry  off  the 
seed  as  it  fell.  If  the  cotton  seed  was  treated  so 
to-day  the  cotton-growers  would  be  losing  in  a 
single  year  $100,000,000  worth  of  valuable  ma- 
terial. -  Instead,  not  far  from  the  gin  stands 
the  oil  mill,  and  the  seed  is  saved  as  carefully  as 
the  baled  limt  at  the  gin.  In  the  market  it  is 
worth  $16  a  ton. 

The  seed  goes  first  through  screens  that  clean 
it  of  bolls,  dust,  and  sand.  The  next  machine  is 
the  linter,  which  strips  the  seed  of  the  short  lint 
the  gin  leaves  on.  This  fuzz  is  used  in  paper  mills. 
The  seeds  next  pass  into  the  huller,  a  machine  set 
with  knives  that  chop  the  seeds  fine;  the  hulls  are 
screened  out  of  the  meats  which  fall,  being  heavier 
than  the  hulls. 

The  hulls  may  be  stored  in  bulk  as  they  come 
out  of  the  huller,  or  pressed  into  bales  for  more 
convenient  handling.  The  meat  fragments  are 
crushed  and  cooked;  then  the  oil  is  pressed  out, 
and  the  residue  molded  into  cakes.  These  cakes 
are  usually  ground  before  the  molding  that  puts 
them  into  the  form  we  see  oil  cake  in  use. 

The  oil  goes  to  the  refinery,  after  separation 


32O  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL   PLANTS 

from  its  sediment.  Refined,  it  is  ready  for  use  in 
cooking,  as  food  adulterants,  as  medicines,  and 
for  miners'  oil.  The  oil  needs  no  apology.  It  is 
a  pity  that  it  has  come  into  use  as  an  imitation 
of  other  oils,  including  butter. 

The  farmer  takes  his  seed  to  mill  and  sells  the 
oil  for  which  he  has  no  need.  He  keeps  the  hulls 
and  the  meal,  which  contain  the  most  valuable 
feed  and  fertilizer  for  his  cattle  and  his  land.  The 
nitrogen,  phosphoric  acid,  and  potash  in  one  ton  of 
cotton  seed  is  worth  $12.75.  A  ton  of  cotton-seed 
meal  contains  the  three  plant  foods  named  above, 
in  about  double  the  quantity,  so  that  its  market 
value  is  $25.  The  farmer  who  keeps  up  his 
farm's  fertility  must  count  the  cost  of  commercial 
fertilizers  very  carefully.  His  decision  is  to  bring 
back  the  seed,  in  one  form  or  another,  sparing  the 
oil  only,  for  that  has  no  value  when  it  is  fed  or  put 
upon  the  land.  With  constant  cropping  the  land 
will  be  impoverished,  and  the  crops  constantly 
poorer,  unless  feeding  the  land  is  practised. 

The  best  form  of  fertilizers  is  barnyard  manures. 
The  wise  farmer  raises  cattle,  feeds  them  the  hulls 
and  meal  left  after  the  lint  and  oil  are  taken  from 
his  cotton  crop  and  sold.  The  cattle  grow,  and 
the  milk,  butter,  and  beef  are  marketed  in  due 
time.  The  manure  is  spread  on  the  fields,  and  so 


Tobacco  is  a  stately  and  beautiful  plant 


8 

I 


ffl 


FIBRE    PLANTS  321 

the  fertilizers  are  better  prepared  to  enrich  the 
ground  at  once  than  if  the  seed  had  been  spread, 
and  the  crops  had  to  wait  until  decay  released  the 
plant  foods. 

Cotton  has  often  been  grown  at  a  distinct  loss, 
and  the  people,  white  and  black,  are  only  recently 
lifting  their  heads  in  hope,  in  the  Cotton  Belt, 
realizing  that  the  grower  may  have  the  comforts 
of  life  as  well  as  the  broker  and  the  manufacturer. 
Wisdom  is  spreading  where  ignorance  once  pre- 
vailed to  keep  the  hard-working  people  in  a  form 
of  slavery  to  worn-out  methods  on  worn-out  land. 

HEMP 

We  all  know  hemp  as  a  roadside  weed,  tall, 
straight,  with  whorls  of  spreading,  lady-finger 
leaves,  all  pitching  at  a  downward  slant,  the 
flowers  clustered  at  the  bases  of  the  leaves,  as 
happens  with  all  members  of  the  stinging  nettle 
family,  to  which  hemp  belongs. 

Wild  hemp,  as  it  grows  escaped  from  cultivation, 
and  in  its  native  region,  western  Asia,  has  poor 
fibre.  But  in  the  hemp  fields  of  Russia,  Austria, 
Turkey,  Italy,  China,  Japan,  and  the  United 
States,  it  may  reach  ten,  and  even  twenty  feet  in 
height.  The  fibres  of  the  inner  bark,  when  prop- 


322  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

erly  separated,  come  out  creamy-white,  soft,  pli- 
able, and  with  a  silky  sheen.  It  is  substituted 
for  linen  in  all  but  the  better  grades  in  the  north 
of  Italy,  where  methods  of  cultivation  and  curing 
produce  the  best  quality  of  fibre. 

The  great  hemp  region  of  this  country  is  the 
Blue  Grass  in  Kentucky,  where  a  rich,  moist, 
well-drained  loam  overlies  limestone.  The  seed 
is  sowed  and  rolled,  but  not  cultivated  after  it 
comes  up.  The  vigorous  plants  get  the  start  of 
the  weeds  and  kill  them  out.  The  roots  plow 
deep,  and  the  stems  soar. 

When  the  flowers  appear  and  the  tops  turn  yel- 
low, then  comes  the  harvest.  The  stems  are  cut 
as  low  as  possible,  for  the  best  fibre  is  at  the  base. 
The  September  sun  dries  the  stalks  that  lie  with 
butts  down  hill  on  the  grass.  In  a  week  they  are 
gathered  into  small  bundles,  tied,  shocked,  or 
stacked. 

In  November  the  stems  are  spread  for  two 
months  so  that  moisture  and  frost  rot  the  outer 
bark  and  woody  centre  of  the  stems  from  the 
fibrous  layer.  This  "retting"  is  sometimes  done 
in  water.  When  the  fibre  separates  easily, 
the  stalks  are  set  up  to  dry.  The  old-fashioned 
hand-breaks  are  used  to  "decorticate"  the  fibre, 
and  clean  it  of  the  fragments  of  bark  and  wood 


FIBRE    PLANTS  323 

left  after  the  breaking  is  done.  The  freed  fibre 
is  tied  in  hanks,  and  these  are  baled  for  market. 
After  being  hackled  it  goes  to  the  twine  factory. 
Often  the  hemp-grower  clears  $30  to  $60  an  acre, 
after  cost  of  growing  it  is  deducted.  And  the  land 
is  left  in  better  condition  than  before  the  hemp 
was  planted. 

The  British  navy  consumes  a  quantity  of  hemp 
fibre  in  the  manufacture  of  the  bags  in  which 
coal  is  carried.  Sail  cloth,  coarse  sheetings  and 
canvas,  carpet  warp  and  rugs,  fish  lines  and  nets, 
and  all  kinds  of  twine  and  ropes  are  made  of  hemp. 

Hemp  seed  is  not  ripe  when  the  canes  are  right 
for  fibre,  so  special  plots  are  grown  for  seed,  which 
is  valuable  as  poultry  food.  Oil  for  paint  is 
extracted  from  the  seed.  The  plants  are  best 
grown  in  hills  so  that  they  have  room  to  branch 
and  produce  the  greatest  amount  of  seed.  The 
seed  crop  often  nets  the  farmer  almost  as  much  as 
if  he  grew  hemp  fibre. 

In  the  Far  East  the  resinous  substance  in  flowers 
and  leaves  of  hemp  is  a  commercial  product  in 
great  demand.  In  various  forms,  to  drink,  to 
chew,  and  to  smoke,  the  intoxicating  drug  is 
universally  used.  The  bhang  is  the  dried  leaves 
and  fruits.  It  may  be  mixed  with  tobacco,  for 
smoking,  or  with  honey  and  spices,  for  a  kind  of 


324  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL   PLANTS 

candy,  or  steeped  like  tea.  Hasheesh  is  the  name 
it  is  known  by  in  Turkey  and  Syria.  Hasheesh 
cakes,  often  huge  in  size,  are  sold  in  the  bazaars. 
The  effect  of  hasheesh  is  pleasantly  stimulating 
at  first;  then  follows  loss  of  sensation,  dulling  of 
pain,  and  sleep  with  pleasant  dreams.  The  result 
of  constant  use  of  the  drug  may  be  insanity. 

MANILA    HEMP 

Manila  hemp  is  a  Philippine  export,  grown  on 
hillsides  of  Luzon  and  other  provinces  that  have 
a  very  humid,  hot  atmosphere.  The  plant,  near 
relative  of  the  banana,  grows  like  the  maize,  or 
Indian  corn.  The  fibre  is  in  the  overlapping 
leaf-sheaths,  that  support  a  stem  twenty  feet  high. 
When  about  five  years  old  the  plant  throws  out  its 
flower  shoot.  When  this  appears,  the  whole  stalk 
is  cut  down;  the  fibrous  leaf-sheaths  split  into 
strips  then  the  strips  drawn  under  the  blunt  edge 
of  a  heavy  knife,  held  against  a  board.  The  process 
scrapes  the  fibre  free  from  pulp.  In  some  places 
the  work  is  now  done  by  machinery. 

This  white  or  pale  red  fibre  is  stiff  and  coarse, 
but  long,  light,  strong,  and  durable.  It  is  the  best 
material  for  binder  twine  and  for  ships'  cables  and 
other  cordage.  When  ropes  wear  out,  the  refuse  is 
made  into  Manila  paper. 


FIBRE    PLANTS  325 

SISAL   HEMP 

The  plants  that  produce  the  fibre  known  to 
commerce  as  "sisal"  are  agaves,  near  relatives  of 
the  century  plant,  or  aloe.  The  leaves  are  mar- 
ginned  with  prickles,  and  grow  out  of  the  centre 
of  the  short  stalk.  After  the  plant  is  three  years 
old  the  outer  leaves  are  cut  off  and  their  fibres 
separated  by  a  machine  called  a  "raspador. " 
For  years  a  pfant  will  go  on  yielding  ten  to  fifteen 
leaves  each  season.  The  throwing  up  of  the 
flower  stem  ends  the  leaf  harvest,  for  the  plant 
dies  when  it  completes  its  work. 

The  "henequen,"  the  sisal  of  Yucatan,  the 
West  Indies,  Mexico,  and  Hawaii,  is  the  most  im- 
portant variety  grown.  It  has  been  established 
in  India  and  in  East  Africa,  where  fibre  of  the 
highest  quality  has  been  produced.  For  cordage, 
sisal  is  second  only  to  Manila  hemp. 

RAMIE 

Another  member  of  the  stinging-nettle  family 
furnishes  a  silky,  fine  fibre  from  its  inner  bark. 
It  is  a  tall,  reedy  stem,  whose  bark  is  stripped 
into  "ribbons"  which  are  scraped  free  of  woody 
tissue,  and  later  of  gum  and  coloring  matter. 
Ramie  underwear  has  been  introduced  here.  But 


326       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

dress  goods  of  this  fibre  are  used  chiefly  in  the 
Orient. 

JUTE 

A  relative  of  our  bass-wood,  native  of  Bengal, 
and  grown  successfully  in  China  and  Japan,  where 
labor  is  very  cheap,  yields  the  jute  fibre  out  of 
which  gunnysacks  are  made.  The  plant  grows 
to  fifteen  feet  high,  a  slender,  unbranched  reed 
that  is  cut  at  flowering  time,  retted,  washed,  and 
whipped,  the  fibre  baled  and  shipped  to  twine 
factories.  Jute  rugs  and  carpets  do  not  last  like 
hemp. 

China  jute  is  made  from  a  plant  that  has  come 
into  our  gardens  as  a  weed  we  call  Indian  mallow 
and  velvet-leaf. 

COIR 

The  cocoa  palm  grows  on  the  shores  of  tropical 
countries,  clustering  its  huge,  three-angled  nuts 
under  an  umbrella  of  leaves.  The  nut  is  egg- 
shaped,  and  the  three-sided,  smooth-rinded  fruit 
is  the  husk.  The  green  husks  contain  coarse, 
stiff,  but  elastic  fibres  that  are  made  into  door  mats 
and  coco  matting  in  this  country.  In  Asia  and 
Europe,  coir  fibre  is  used  for  cables.  The  bulk  of 
the  coir  of  commerce  comes  from  Ceylon,  and 
from  the  southern  shores  of  India  and  China. 


FIBRE    PLANTS  327 

The  fibre  becomes  brittle  if  the  nuts  are  allowed 
to  ripen.  It  is  used  for  leaf  mold  in  greenhouses 
and  conservatories. 

RAFFIA 

The  long,  thin  strips  of  strong,  tying  material 
that  hang  in  greenhouses  and  packing  sheds  of 
nurseries  are  obtained  by  skinning  the  leaves 
of  a  palm  tfee  that  grows  abundantly  in  the 
wilds  of  Madagascar  and  Brazil.  The  "Arts  and 
Crafts"  people  discovered  its  usefulness  in  bas- 
ketry, weaving,  and  other  fancy  work.  Milliners 
made  it  into  hats.  The  increased  demand  has 
doubled  the  price.  It  can  be  bought  in  a  variety 
of  colors.  The  uses  are  not  yet  extensive  enough 
greatly  to  increase  the  present  demand. 

BROOM    CORN 

Three  varieties  of  sorghum  are  important:  two 
as  food  plants,  and  the  third  furnishes  the  house- 
wife with  brooms.  Kafir  corn  feeds  stock  and 
poultry  in  this  country:  it  feeds  both  man  and 
beast  in  Africa,  India,  and  China.  Sorghum 
molasses  replaces  sugar  to  a  considerable  extent. 
In  our  country  to-day,  it  is  a  feeble  competitor 
of  sugar-cane  and  beets. 


328  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

All  of  these  species  of  sorghum  belong  to  one 
genus,  Andropogon,  a  member  of  the  great  Grass 
Family  upon  which  the  world  depends  for  food. 
The  blossom  is  a  branching  panicle  at  the  top  of 
a  jointed  stalk  that  grows  like  maize.  There  is 
no  ear  —  the  seeds  follow  the  blossoms  on  the 
top. 

Broom  corn  seed  is  planted  later  than  corn  in 
fields  within  the  Corn  Belt  and  farther  south. 
Its  culture  is  like  that  given  to  corn,  and  as 
the  bloom  passes  the  grower  watches  the  clouds 
anxiously.  Dry,  clear  weather  is  needed  for  the 
harvest.  The  crop  is  the  "brush,"  or  top,  made 
up  of  fine,  wiry,  and  very  long  branches  that  bear 
the  small  seeds.  In  the  fields  of  standard  varieties 
the  harvest  involves  the  "tabling"  of  the  stalks, 
before  the  cutting  of  the  heads.  The  stalks  are 
partly  severed  three  feet  from  the  ground,  and  the 
tops  bent  diagonally  over  so  that  the  brush  lies 
across  the  broken  stalks  of  the  neighboring  row. 
The  bent  stalks  form  a  table  on  which  the  heads 
lie  to  dry.  Each  brush  has  two  or  three  inches  of 
stalk  left  for  a  handle,  and  is  in  prime  condition  if 
cut  right  after  the  bloom  fades.  If  the  seeds 
ripen,  the  straws  become  brittle' and  stiff. 

Dwarf  varieties  are  grown  for  whisk  brooms. 
The  stalks  are  pulled  after  blooming,  and  the 


FIBRE    PLANTS  329 

brushes  dried  and  cut  off.     Oklahoma  and  Kansas 
are  large  producers  of  dwarf  broom  corn. 

The  special  thresher  or  seed  stripper,  a  kind  of 
comb,  removes  the  seeds  from  the  straw,  after 
which  the  brushes  are  finished  by  being  quickly 
dried  in  airy,  shady  sheds,  to  preserve  the  green 
color  as  much  as  possible.  The  brushes  are  then 
compressed  into  200  to  300  pound  bales  for  ship- 
ment to  the  broom  factories,  or  to  the  wholesale 
market. 


Plants  That  Serve  Many  or  Special  Purposes 


CHAPTER  XI 
BAMBOOS 

THE  giant  grasses,  that  are  more  familiar  to  us 
in  fish  poles  than  in  any  other  of  the  uses  they 
serve,  grow  from  sea  level  to  an  altitude  of  15,000 
feet.  If  we  think  of  the  clump  of  bamboo  that 
makes  an  attractive  feature  in  a  neighbor's  garden, 
it  is  a  surprise  to  learn  that  some  tropical  species 
reach  a  height  of  over  one  hundred  feet,  and  a 
diameter  of  a  foot  at  base.  Even  these  jointed 
canes  that  almost  touch  the  sky  are  slim  and 
graceful.  In  all,  there  are  over  two  hundred 
different  species  of  bamboo,  growing  chiefly  in 
tropical  countries,  all  around  the  globe.  The 
Temperate  Zone  has  a  few  species  that  are  small 
and  unimportant  in  comparison. 

In  Chinese  restaurants  a  savory  stew  contains 
the  tender  shoots  of  bamboo.  These  blanched 
tips  of  oriental  species  are  also  served  like  as- 
paragus, or  boiled  with  rice,  or  pickled,  or 
candied.  The  seeds  of  some  species  are  like 
wheat,  and  these  are  mixed  with  honey,  or 

333 


334  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

parched  for  food.     Nut-like  seeds  of  another  kind 
are  roasted. 

We  must  go  into  a  tropical  country,  where 
primitive  people  live,  to  see  how  many  everyday 
uses  the  bamboos  can  be  put  to.  The  great 
naturalist,  Alfred  Russel  Wallace,  was  amazed 
at  what  he  saw  in  Borneo,  of  the  admirable 
qualities  and  clever  uses  of  the  abundant  reeds. 
"Their  strength,  lightness,  smoothness,  straight- 
ness,  roundness,  and  hollowness,  the  facility  and 
regularity  with  which  they  can  be  split,  their  many 
different  sizes,  the  varying  length  of  their  joints, 
the  ease  with  which  they  can  be  cut  and  with 
which  holes  can  be  made  through  them,  their 
hardness  outside,  their  freedom  from  any  pro- 
nounced taste  or  smell,  their  great  abundance,  and 
the  rapidity  of  their  growth  and  increase  are  all 
qualities  which  render  them  useful  for  a  hundred 
different  purposes,  to  serve  which  other  materials 
would  require  much  more  labor  and  preparation. 
The  bamboo  is  one  of  the  most  wonderful  and 
most  beautiful  productions  of  the  tropics,  and 
one  of  Nature 's  most  valuable  gifts  to  uncivilized 


man.' 


Then  follows  a  long  account  of  the  Dyak  houses, 
built  and  furnished  with  useful  articles,  even  to 
cooking  vessels,  all  of  bamboo.  The  solid  wall 


MANY   OR   SPECIAL   PURPOSES  335 

that  separates  the  pithy  joint  sections  enables 
the  brown  man  to  make,  with  his  knife  in  a  very 
short  time,  a  complete  set  of  dishes  that  stand 
straight  and  hold  water.  A  single  reed  makes 
cups  and  bowls,  the  sizes  ranging  from  the  thick 
base  to  the  narrow  tip. 

Certain  dwarf  bamboos  cultivated  in  China 
furnish  material  used  in  the  manufacture  of  paper 
of  all  grades.  Quite  as  many  uses  are  found  for 
small  species  as  for  the  giant  reeds  used  as  posts 
and  joist  for  houses  and  masts  for  vessels.  The 
thin,  hard  rind  makes  knives  with  which  arrows, 
pens,  and  such  small  things  are  cut  and  finished. 

PALMS 

The  rank  of  "Princes  of  the  Vegetable  King- 
dom," given  by  grateful  natives  of  tropical 
countries,  is  certainly  deserved,  for  the  uses  to 
which  palm  trees  are  put'  are  without  number. 
"They  are  among  Nature's  most  generous  gifts  to 
uncivilized  men"  —  to  quote  the  words  of  Wallace 
who  spoke  of  the  bamboo  in  the  East  Indies. 

To  begin  with,  there  are  in  tropical  and  sub- 
tropical countries  over  1,200  different  kinds  of 
palms.  They  are  mostly  trees  of  slender,  un- 
branched  stems,  crowned  or  feathered  with  a 


336  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

graceful  head  of  foliage.  All  are  of  the  same 
structure  as  reeds  and  grasses,  in  that  they  have 
round  stalks  composed  of  a  pithy,  central  part 
enclosed  in  a  hard  rind,  and  growth  is  not  in- 
dicated by  rings  of  wood  added  year  by  year. 
The  flowers  are  in  spikes  or  clusters,  usually  com- 
ing out  of  the  crown  of  the  tree,  and  each  flower 
is  on  the  plan  of  three.  Staminate  and  pistillate 
flowers  are  separate,  though  the  clusters  may  be 
on  the  same  or  different  trees. 

Leaves  differ  in  form  of  blade,  but  between  the 
palmate  and  pinnate  types,  and  all  have  stems, 
usually  with  clasping  or  sheathing  bases.  Our 
familiar  palm-leaf  fan  illustrates  the  palmate 
form;  the  funeral  palm,  the  pinnate  or  feather 
form.  The  most  exuberant  species  bears  leaves 
ten  to  thirty  feet  in  length.  The  highest  palm 
trees  reach  two  hundred  feet. 

An  old  saying,  of  tropical  origin,  perhaps,  says 
there  is  a  use  for  the"  palm  for  every  day  in  the 
year.  The  Hindoo  goes  further;  for  of  one  noble 
species  of  India  he  claims  eight  hundred  distinct 
uses!  What  claim  can  be  exaggerated  for  trees 
that  furnish  all  the  parts  for  a  house  and  the 
furniture  in  it:  thatch  to  keep  out  sun  and  rain, 
fibre  for  clothing,  for  paper,  for  ropes,  brooms,  and 
rugs;  meal  for  bread,  sugar,  wine,  and  a  cabbage- 


Who  can  count  the  uses  of  the  oriental  bamboo? 


I 


I" 


It 


•3 

s 

rt 
fl 

I 

s 
I 
u 


MANY    OR    SPECIAL    PURPOSES  337 

like  vegetable,  the  heart  of  the  palmetto!  Delic- 
ious food  and  drink  come  from  the  coco  palm; 
wax  from  two  species;  resin  for  unnumbered  uses 
from  the  palm  called  the  "dragon's  blood." 

The  savage  tips  his  spears  and  his  poisoned 
arrows  with  the  spines  of  certain  kinds  of  palm 
leaves.  He  makes  knives  of  keen  edge  of  the  thin, 
hard  edges  of  leaf  stems.  Tanning  materials  from 
palms  are  used  in  the  making  of  fine  leathers. 
Dyes  are  derived  from  other  kinds.  Valuable 
oils  are  among  the  best  products  of  palm  trees. 

THE   COCO-NUT   PALM 

The  coco-nut  palm  grows  best  on  the  shelly, 
barren  soil  of  tropical  shores.  It  loves  the  sea  air, 
and  as  it  grows,  leans  toward  the  water!  A  crown 
of  leaves  shelters  the  clustered  nuts  that  turn  from 
green  to  brown  as  they  ripen. 

It  is  the  delight  of  native  boys  and  men  to  run 
up  the  trees  and  throw  down  nuts,  to  the  wonder 
of  strangers,  who  pay  the  acrobats  well  for  their 
feats,  and  who  enjoy  the  fresh  food  and  drink  thus 
supplied.  Inside  the  shiny,  brown,  three-cor- 
nered husk  is  the  hard-shelled  nut,  lined  with  a 
thick  layer  of  white  meat,  rich  in  flavor  and  in  food 
value.  The  husk  yields  the  useful  fibre  known  in 


commerce  as  "  coir. " 


338  THE    BOOK    OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

The  wide  distribution  of  the  coco  palm  is  due  to 
the  fact  that  the  nuts  float,  and  are  not  injured 
by  sea  water,  as  they  drift  to  other  shores.  They 
grow  in  the  tropics  of  all  continents,  and  are  the 
chief  food  of  the  inhabitants  of  many  tropical 
islands.  '. 

Coc os  means  monkey,  in  the  Portuguese  language. 
So  it  must  have  been  when  he  was  looking  at  the 
funny  little  monkey  face  on  the  end  of  a  nut,  the 
end  with  the  three  flat  penny  spots  on  it,  that  the 
botanist  adopted  the  name  that  was  applied  in  fun 
to  the  familiar  nut  by  a  Portuguese  sailor. 

The  meaning  of  the  three  spots  is  not  clear  at 
first.  One  is  always  largest;  this  is  the  one  that 
breaks  to  let  the  little  plant  escape  on  germination. 
The  nut  was  intended  to  be  in  three  compart- 
ments, with  a  plantlet,  or  embryo,  in  each.  But 
long  ago  the  partitions  between  the  chambers  got 
into  the  way  of  breaking  down,  and  a  single  seed 
was  developed,  in  the  place  of  three.  The  two 
prints  are  all  that  are  left  to  show  that  the  plant 
has  decided  to  have  fewer  and  therefore  stronger 
seeds. 

We  know  the  coco-nuts  as  they  come  to  our 
markets,  freed  of  their  bulky  husks,  and  carried 
as  ballast  in  the  holds  of  vessels  from  Jamaica  and 
Trinidad.  There  is  a  tremendous  demand  for 


MANY    OR    SPECIAL    PURPOSES  339 

them  in  the  United  States.  We  know  the  shred- 
ded and  dried  meat  of  the  nuts,  that  lend  such  a 
fine  flavor  to  desserts  and  candies  we  make.  We 
do  not  know  cctpra,  though. 

The  dry  meats  are  shipped  under  this  name 
from  the  South  Sea  Islands  and  other  far  regions, 
to  be  sold  at  the  factories  where  presses  extract 
the  valuable  coco-nut  oil  of  commerce.  Planta- 
tions of  the  coco  palms  have  been  planted  in  the 
Old  World  as  oil  producers.  In  the  New  World, 
Brazil,  and  the  West  Indies,  they  are  set  out  as 
fruit  plantations. 

THE    DATE    PALM 

The  Arab  may  well  claim  that  the  best  palm  in 
all  the  world  is  his  beautiful,  feathery-leaved, 
desert-loving  date  palm,  the  palm  of  the  Bible, 
and  of  ancient  history  in  many  languages.  The 
hot  sun  only  sweetens  and  dries  the  great  clusters 
of  dates,  that  feed  the  family,  the  camels,  the 
horses,  and  the  dogs.  Wherever  the  Arab  emi- 
grant has  gone,  the  date  palm  has  followed,  and 
become  the  dooryard  tree,  as  it  is  at  home.  The 
meanest  surroundings,  the  poorest  soil,  do  not 
discourage  the  wonderful  plant.  Where  there  is 
sufficient  water  it  grows,  and  makes  a  grateful 


34O      THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

shade,  and  abundant  food  -for  the  traveller.  The 
desert  of  Sahara  would  not  have  been  threaded 
by  highways  of  oriental  commerce  in  the  past 
centuries  except  that  date  palms  grew  at  the 
scattered  oases,  and  furnished  cheer  for  the  weary 
caravans. 

We  can  understand  the  jealous  feeling  that  led 
the  crafty  Arabs  of  Asia  Minor  and  Tunis  to  cheat 
the  clever  and  energetic  American  horticulturists 
with  seeds  of  inferior  seedling  varieties  when  the 
effort  was  first  made  to  establish  date  culture  in 
the  hot  regions  of  this  country.  The  date  palm 
does  not  come  true  from  seed,  and  of  seedling 
trees,  but  one  in  a  great  host  can  be  expected  to  be 
a  fruit  of  any  merit.  So  progress  has  been  slow, 
and  discouragements  many  in  the  few  spots 
adapted  to  successful  date  culture  in  America. 
At  last  suckers  of  good  varieties  have  been 
obtained  from  dependable  sources  in  the  best 
date-growing  regions  of  North  Africa  and  Arabia, 
and  we  are  at  last  getting  home-grown  dates  from 
trees  in  the  torrid  Imperial  Valley  of  southern 
California,  from  Yuma,  Arizona,  and  other  points, 
where  the  work  of  the  Government  Plant  Intro- 
duction Bureau  was  first  successful. 

One  thing  the  Arabs  discovered  long  ago:  the 
staminate,  or  male  trees,  are  barren,  and  the 


MANY   OR   SPECIAL   PURPOSES  34! 

pistillate,  or  female  trees,  require  to  be  fertilized, 
or  they,  too,  are  barren,  though  they  blossom 
luxuriantly.  It  is  a  simple  thing  to  cut  a  cluster 
of  the  pollen-loaded  staminate  flowers,  and  shake 
them  over  the  pistillate  clusters  in  the  other  trees. 
One  pollen-bearing  tree  among  twenty-five  fertile 
ones  will  supply  all  the  pollen  needed.  And  the 
sex  of  a  tree  can  be  relied  upon  at  the  setting  out 
of  a  new  orchard.  Cuttings,  or  suckers,  reproduce 
their  parent  trees.  Suckers  from  bearing  trees 
will  bear  when  half  a  dozen  years  old,  or  even 
younger.  Many  a  tree  stands  alone  in  a  garden, 
blossoms  freely,  then  ripens  no  fruit;  it  lacks  the 
fertilization.  Without  pollen  no  fruit  can  be  pro- 
duced. 

The  beginning  of  work  looking  toward  the 
development  of  date-growing  in  this  country  was 
made  in  1891.  Already  it  is  demonstrated  a  suc- 
cess. Time  will  bring  the  increase.  We  are  even 
now  growing  dates  that  excite  the  envy  of  the 
old  Arabian  growers,  for  we  have  Science,  the 
great  Magician,  helping  us. 

THE    RATTAN   PALM 

The  Royal  palms  are  noble  specimens  of  their 
race.  But  one  of  these  is  not  more  interesting 


342       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

than  the  rattan  palm,  that  has  not  the  necessary 
stiffness  to  grow  erect.  I  quote  the  interesting 
description  given  by  Mr.  Wallace,  who  saw  the 
plant  in  the  Island  of  Celebes: 

"The  chief  feature  of  this  forest  was  the  abun- 
dance of  the  rattan  palms,  hanging  from  the  trees, 
and  turning  and  twisting  about  on  the  ground 
often  in  inextricable  confusion.  One  wonders  at 
first  how  they  get  into  such  queer  shapes;  but  it  is 
evidently  caused  by  the  decay  and  fall  of  the 
trees  up  which  they  have  first  climbed,  after  which 
they  grow  along  the  ground  till  they  meet  with 
another  trunk  up  which  to  ascend.  A  tangled 
mass  of  twisted,  living  rattan  is  therefore  a  sign 
that  at  some  former  period  a  large  tree  has  fallen 
there,  though  there  may  be  not  the  slightest 
vestige  of  it  left. 

"  The  rattan  seems  to  have  unlimited  powers  of 
growth,  and  a  single  plant  may  mount  up  several 
trees  in  succession,  and  thus  reach  the  enormous 
length  they  are  said  sometimes  to  attain.  They 
much  improve  the  appearance  of  a  forest  as  seen 
from  the  coast;  for  they  vary  the  otherwise  monot- 
onous tree-tops  with  feathery  crowns  of  leaves, 
rising  clear  above  them,  and  each  terminating  in  an 
erect  leafy  spike  rising  like  a  lightning-conductor." 

The  usefulness  of  the  long,  tough,  supple  stems 


MANY   OR    SPECIAL    PURPOSES  343 

of  the  rattan  palms  is  illustrated  in  homes  the 
world  over.  Split  rattan  canes  are  the  splints 
woven  into  seats  and  backs  of  chairs  and  couches. 
All  kinds  of  be'autiful  furniture  are  made  up  with 
rattan  weaving.  It  is  a  combination  of  strength 
and  lightness,  lace-like  delicacy  of  pattern  and 
color,  that  makes  for  comfort,  especially  in  warm 
climates,  where  solid  wood  or  metal  furniture 
require  stuffy  cushions.  Cane  seats  are  cool  and 
elastic. 

The  round  rattan  canes  are  used  for  many  pur- 
poses; whip  stocks,  walking  sticks,  and  hoops. 
Split  into  splints  they  are  made  into  baskets,  fish 
nets,  weirs,  and  brooms. 

THE    IVORY   PALM 

A  low-growing  palm  of  South  America,  fruits  in 
a  "head"  of  hard,  heavy  clustered  capsules,  con- 
taining four  to  ten  hard,  ivory-like  seeds,  each  the 
size  of  a  hen's  egg.  The  texture  of  the  seed  is 
much  like  the  ivory  of  the  elephant's  tusk,  and  is 
used  in  making  buttons,  and  carved  into  orna- 
ments of  various  kinds. 

THE    SUGAR    PALMS 

A  traveller  in  the  East  Indies  describes  the 
making  of  sugar  from  the  true  sugar  palm  and  the 


344  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

coco  palm.  "Each  day  the  tapped  trees  of  the 
latter  species  yield  two  quarts  of  sap  that  boils 
down  to  three  or  four  ounces  of  sugar.  That  has 
a  nutty  fragrance  and  flavor,  as  unique  as  maple 
sugar.  We  were  not  long  in  learning  to  melt  coco- 
palm  sugar  and  pour  it  on  grated  ripe  coconut, 
thus  achieving  a  sweet  supreme.  The  sugar  of  the 
true  sugar  palm  of  the  market-places  looks  and 
tastes  like  other  brown  sugar." 

HOPS 

The  vine  from  which  the  housewife,  a  generation 
ago,  picked  the  hops  and  dried  them  for  use  in 
making  a  yeast,  is  still  grown  in  many  a  backyard, 
but  the  compressed  yeast  and  the  dry  cakes  have 
taken  place  of  the  good  old-fashioned  jug  yeast 
on  which  the  daily  bread  of  the  family  depended. 
The  hop  vine  is  ornamental  now,  trailing  its  long 
fingers  over  the  lattice  that  screens  from  view  the 
neighbors'  barns  and  any  unsightly  objects  in  the 
landscape.  One  good  feature  of  the  hop  vine  is 
the  twenty  feet  or  more  of  growth  it  makes  in  a 
single  season.  While  slower  vines  are  coming  on 
it  covers  its  trellis  and  reaches  for  more,  climbing 
onto  the  roof  or  up  telegraph  poles,  with  apparent 
joy  in  its  freedom. 


MANY   OR   SPECIAL   PURPOSES  345 

Hop  leaves  are  cleft  like  those  of  the  grape  and 
the  hard  maples.  The  inconspicuous  flowers  are 
followed  by  clusters  of  pale  green  catkins  or  cones, 
called  "hops,"  £hat  contrast  beautifully  with  the 
dark  foliage.  Only  the  fertile  (female)  plants 
bear  fruit  in  hops,  the  flower  cluster  of  the  sterile 
(male)  plants  merely  pollenating  the  fertile  ones, 
then  fading,  leaving' the  vine  barren. 

Hops  are  a  valuable  crop  to  raise,  since  the 
"burs"  are  used  in  the  brewing  of  malt  liquors. 
Two  pounds  of  dry  hops  are  needed  for  each  barrel 
of  beer.  They  give  a  pleasant  bitter  flavor  to  all 
malt  beverages,  and  keep  them  from  turning  sour. 

Young  hop  plantations  are  set  with  cuttings 
from  the  root  crowns  of  old  plants.  Various 
systems  of  trellises  are  used  to  carry  the  vines  up 
where  they  get  the  sun  to  the  best  advantage,  and 
can  be  best  let  down  for  the  picking  of  the  crop. 
The  climbing  goes  on  without  help  in  fine  weather, 
the  tendrils  helped  by  the  hooked  hairs  that 
roughen  the  leaves.  But  gray  weather  dis- 
courages the  climbing,  the  shoots  must  be  tied  up 
or  they  fall.  They  refuse  to  climb  any  slope  of 
less  than  45  per  cent.,  unless  helped  by  being  tied 
at  intervals. 

Four  sterile  plants  to  the  acre  are  sufficient  for 
fertilization  of  the  fruiting  vines.  When  the  burs 


346  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

feel  papery  and  September  is  at  hand,  women  and 
children  from  the  cities  go  out  to  the  hop  harvest 
in  England  and  the  United  States.  New  York 
has  a  large  hop-growing  section  near  Syracuse. 
The  average  picker  gets  forty  to  sixty  bushels 
picked  in  a  day.  The  boxes  are  carried  to  the 
dry  house,  where  the  hops  are  spread  on  a  cloth 
that  lies  on  a  slatted  floor  above  a  room  heated 
by  a  furnace.  Sulphur,  burned  at  first,  bleaches 
color  out  of  the  hops,  which  come  out  a  pale  straw 
color  twelve  hours  after  they  enter  the  dry,  hot 
atmosphere.  They  are  cooled  and  sweated,  then 
pressed  into  solid  cakes  by  hand  presses.  These 
bricks  of  hops,  in  cloth  cases,  weigh  nearly  200 
pounds,  and  are  five  feet  long  and  twenty  inches 
square  at  the  ends.  In  this  condition  they  keep 
indefinitely. 

The  cultivated  hop  is  merely  the  wild  species, 
native  to  Europe  and  America,  member  of  the 
Nettle  Family,  brought  into  domestication.  No- 
where does  it  grow  in  greater  luxuriance  than  along 
river  banks,  where  it  finds  rich,  moist  soil,  and 
plenty  of  support  in  climbing. 

The  price  of  hops  is  peculiarly  liable  to  change. 
Not  many  years  ago  it  flopped  from  12  cents  to 
$1.20  the  pound,  without  any  noticeable  reason 
for  the  astonishing  difference.  Ordinarily  the 


MANY   OR    SPECIAL    PURPOSES  347 

price  runs  between  12  and  40  cents.  The  crop 
pays  well,  unless  it  is  an  off  year,  when  weather 
and  insect  enemies  are  against  success. 

RAPE 

A  certain  amount  of  rape-seed  must  go  into  the 
bird-seed  ration  of  the  canary,  or  your  singer  will 
not  be  well  and  happy.  This  every  person  who 
keeps  a  bird  knows.  Rape-seed  produces  an 
oil  that  is  valuable  for  a  number  of  different  uses, 
and  is  as  common  in  European  countries  as  kero- 
sene is  in  the  United  States. 

The  rape  plant  is  a  thin-rooted  relative  of  the 
turnip,  with  a  decided  turnip  odor,  when  a  leaf  is 
bruised.  Above  the  stringy  root  rises  a  large 
head  of  succulent  blue-green  foliage,  the  leaves 
much  divided  and  curled,  like  leaves  of  some  of  the 
kales.  The  tops  grow  two  and  three  feet  high  on 
good,  mellow  soil;  even  four  feet  in  soil  especially 
rich  and  well-tilled. 

The  farmer  sows  the  seed  broadcast  on  a  field 
from  which  he  has  harvested  an  early  crop,  like 
oats.  Two  months  later  he  turns  his  pigs  or 
sheep  in,  and  they  graze  the  tops  off.  It  is  best 
to  let  the  stock  have  grass  pasture,  too,  for  rape 
alone  makes  flabby  flesh,  and  animals  are  likely  to 


348  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

eat  more  than  is  good  for  them.  Feeders  of  stock 
find  the  better  plan  is  to  cut  the  rape  and  feed  it 
with  grain  and  dry  fodder  in  stable  and  feed  lot.  • 

Other  methods  are  to  sow  oats,  and  a  fortnight 
later  sow  rape,  and  harrow  it  in.  The  oats  have 
the  start  of  the  other  crop;  they  are  harvested 
while  the  tops  of  the  rape  are  short.  Four  weeks 
later  the  field  is  just  right  to  turn  sheep  into.  As 
fast  as  the  tops  are  gnawed  off  new  leaves  are 
formed.  This  pasture  keeps  on  coming  when 
others  are  dry. 

Rape  makes  a  good  nurse  plant  for  clover,  which 
is  feeble  in  starting,  and  needs  shade.  This  com- 
bination forms  a  good  cover  crop  in  young  or- 
chards. Feeding  off  the  rape  does  no  great  harm 
once  the  clover  becomes  established. 

In  this  country  the  value  of  rape  is  not  yet 
realized  by  farmers  and  stock  raisers.  One  visit 
to  a  good  English  farm  would  convert  them. 

For  oil,  the  rape-seed  is  put  through  fanning 
mills,  and  cleaned  of  all  foreign  bodies.  Then  it  is 
run  through  rollers,  which  reduce  it  to  a  paste. 
Next,  this  paste  is  heated,  and  put  under  a  pres- 
sure of  2,840  pounds  to  the  square  inch.  The  oil 
oozes  from  under  the  press,  and  is  collected  in 
troughs  that  lead  to  reservoirs.  The  cake  that 
remains  is  ground  and  sold  for  stock  food,  as  rape- 


MANY   OR   SPECIAL   PURPOSES  349 

seed  meal.  It  is  also  used  as  a  fertilizer.  It  still 
contains  considerable  oil,  and  is  rich  in  nitrogen, 
the  most  expensive  element  that  plants  require. 
The  oil  is  refined  and  filtered  for  table  use  and 
for  cooking.  Without  filtering,  it  is  the  staple 
illuminating  oil  of  Europe,  and  is  quite  as  com- 
monly used  for  lubrication. 

I  do  not  know  of  a  better  instance  of  a  weed  that 
has  been  brought  into  the  service  of  man  than  rape, 
which  makes  wealth  in  so  many  forms,  both  as 
raw  materials  and  easily  manufactured  products. 

FULLER'S  TEASEL 

In  this  day,  machinery  takes  the  raw  wool  and 
cards,  spins,  weaves,  and  dyes  it,  with  scarcely  a 
hand  touching  the  warp  or  woof  until  the  finished 
cloth  is  rolled  onto  a  bolt  for  the  merchant  to 
unroll  on  his  counter.  One  process  in  the  making 
of  cloth  depends  upon  the  seed  heads  of  a  weedy 
plant.  No  inventor  has  been  able  to  imitate  in 
steel  the  fuller's  teasel.  It  comes  down  into  the 
modern  woolen  mills  from  the  days  when  it  helped 
the  hand  worker  co  bring  up  the  "nap"  on  cloth. 
All  the  primitive  machinery  has  passed  into  mus- 
eums —  all  but  the  hooks  on  the  teasels.  They 
were  as  flexible,  as  strong,  as  efficient  in  the  begin- 


35O      THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

ning  of  cloth  manufacture  as  now.  The  only 
improvement  they  have  seen  is  in  the  device  that 
holds  them  in  position  as  they  do  their  inimitable 
work  in  finishing  fine  cloth. 

For  blankets  and  other  woolens  with  the  longest 
nap,  the  "king"  teasel  heads  are  required.  Shorter 
nap,  such  as  English  cloths  have,  is  made  by  the 
"queens."  Broadcloth  has  a  fine,  short  nap  that 
is  produced  by  the  smallest  teasel  heads,  called 
"buttons." 

The  common  teasel  of  waysides  and  neglected 
fields  is  not  the  same  as  the  cultivated  "fuller's 
teasel."  But  it  is  so  close  to  it  that  few  people 
would  distinguish  the  commercial  from  the  worth- 
less species,  unless  they  had  experience  in  teasel- 
buying.  Look  at  a  full-grown  teasel,  and  the 
"king"  is  easily  seen  standing  at  the  top  of  the 
straight,  main  stem.  The  "queens"  are  on  the 
ends  of  the  main  branches.  The  "buttons"  tip  the 
secondary  branches.  One  king,  several  queens, 
and  a  multitude  of  buttons  —  that  is  the  way  they 
run  in  size  and  numbers. 

Teasel  plants  have  some  very  interesting  pecul- 
iarities. The  paired  leaves  that  clasp  the  stem 
form  a  deep  cup  at  each  joint  where  branches  start, 
and  this  cup  catches  and  holds  a  pint  or  so  of  water. 
If  this  water  is  lost,  the  heads  above  will  not  be 


MANY   OR    SPECIAL    PURPOSES  35! 

perfectly  formed.  At  least,  this  is  what  growers 
of  fuller's  teasels  declare.  They  say,  too,  that  the 
flowers  of  all  other  heads  depend  on  the  king  for 
pollen,  and  if  the  king  is  dethroned  at  blooming 
time  the  other  heads  will  fail  to  mature  seeds, 
though  they  come  to  larger  size. 

If  the  teasel  is  grown  in  your  neighborhood,  find 
out  if  these  things  are  true.  The  cultivated  species 
is  raised  on  a  commercial  scale  in  Onondaga 
County,  New  York,  where  is  it  a  great  success. 
Small  plantations  in  Oregon  do  well,  but  buyers 
prefer  the  New  York  teasels. 

European  countries  buy  buttons  from  America 
for  broadcloths,  and  we  import  kings  for  the 
making  of  our  blankets.  So  there  is  exchange 
between  teasel-growing  countries. 

Teasel  seed  is  planted  in  drills,  the  plants 
thinned  to  ten  inches  apart  in  the  rows  and  culti- 
vated like  corn.  Each  forms  a  large  rosette  of 
leaves  the  first  year,  and  throws  up  the  blossom 
stalk  the  second  spring.  The  blossoms,  crowded 
on  the  oval  head,  begin  to  bloom  in  a  purple  belt 
around  the  middle.  As  these  flowers  fade,  the 
bloom  proceeds  toward  the  top  and  bottom. 
Two  bands  of  purple  are  moving  in  opposite  di- 
rections, until  the  base  and  tip  have  shed  their 
withered  petals.  This  curious  habit  may  be  seen 


352       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

in  any  roadside  teasel.  The  wiry,  backward- 
turning  bracts  under  the  individual  blossoms  are 
the  hooks  that  "full"  the  cloth  by  picking  up 
the  ends  of  fibres,  and  thus  forming  the  desired 
"nap." 

The  teasel  buyer  pays  about  a  dollar  a  thousand 
(ten  pounds)  for  dry  heads.  The  grower  cuts  the 
heads  with  a  few  inches  of  stem,  and  spreads  them 
in  lofts  of  barns  or  sheds  to  dry.  A  fair  yield  in 
New  York  is  100,000  heads  per  acre.  In  Europe 
intensive  farming  on  land  much  higher  in  value 
produces  a  crop  three  or  four  times  as  large. 
Considering  that  the  field  is  in  use  two  years,  and 
must  be  very  carefully  tilled,  the  grower's  income 
is  not  large,  though  it  is  good.  His  job  is  to  sort 
the  heads,  shorten  the  stems,  and  pack  his  stock 
for  shipment  to  the  manufacturer.  The  heads  are 
surprisingly  long-lived  in  use,  the  hooks  having  to 
be  cleaned  of  fuzz  often  before  they  become  worn 
out. 

RUBBER   PLANTS 

When  white  men  first  came  to  South  America 
and  explored  the  Amazon  River  and  adjoining 
territory,  they  saw  native  Indians  at  home,  and 
had  many  surprises  regarding  the  life  they  lead. 
They  noticed  k  game  played  with  a  large  ball  of 


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MANY   OR   SPECIAL   PURPOSES  353 

dark  substance,  that  bounded  high  when  it  struck 
the  ground.  It  was  natural  for  the  strangers  to 
examine  the  ball,  and  try  to  find  out  what  it  was 
made  of.  The  Indians  called  it  by  a  name  that 
sounded  like  "ca-chook. "  The  substance  was  not 
rigid,  but  flexible;  could  be  kneaded  out  of  shape, 
but  returned  to  its  round  form  when  pressure  was 
released*  The  Indians  said  it  was  the  dried  juice 
of  a  tree,  but  for  some  time  the  curious  explorers 
had  no  idea  what  trees  produced  it.  Some  one 
of  them,  handling  a  bit  of  the  strange  substance, 
—  possibly  writing  a  letter  describing  it  —  dis- 
covered that  it  takes  out  pencil  marks.  He  was 
probably  delighted  to  discover  this  useful  property 
of  the  bouncing  ball.  He  called  it  "rubber,"  and 
this  name  has  always  stuck,  and  no  other  sub- 
stance has  been  found  so  good  for  pencil  erasers,  to 
this  day. 

We  can  imagine  the  interest  roused  in  Europe 
by  the  specimens  of  rubber  that  reached  there  from 
America.  Explorers  in  the  Amazon  territory,  and 
other  tropical  regions,  found  that  the  natives  had 
rubber  in  their  possession.  Not  long  before  our 
Revolution,  a  party  of  Frenchmen  saw  natives 
tapping  trees  and  gathering  the  flow  of  juice. 
This  was  the  first  discovery  by  white  men  of  trees 
that  yield  rubber.  They  learned  how  the  juice 


354       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

was  converted  into  rubber,  in  the  districts  now 
forming  the  countries  of  Brazil  and  Guiana. 

What  real  good  is  there  in  a  substance  that  can 
be  pressed  out  of  shape,  but  returns  when  pressure 
is  removed?  That  is  capable  of  being  stretched 
and  of  flying  back  to  its  original  length  ?  At  first 
the  new  product  seemed  more  interesting  than 
useful.  The  growing  European  demand  for  the 
rubber  stimulated  the  Indians  to  go  on  gathering 
"wild  rubber." 

The  vast  number  of  uses  to  which  rubber  is  put 
to-day  make  it  seem  a  necessity  of  life.  We  smile 
at  the  grave  scientist  of  the  eighteenth  century 
who  gave  out  as  his  judgment  that  the  new  sub- 
stance would  attain  some  popularity  as  an  eraser 
of  pencil  marks,  but,  as  for  him,  bread  crumbs 
were  very  satisfactory  for  that  purpose.  Not 
long  afterward,  Samuel  Piat  discovered  a  process 
of  waterproofing  cloth  by  treating  it  with  India 
rubber  dissolved  in  turpentine.  Our  raincoats 
take  their  names  from  a  Mr.  Macintosh  who  im- 
proved upon  the  original  patent.  Then  came  the 
invention  of  Goodyear,  who,  by  the  addition  of 
sulphur,  hardened  rubber,  and  adapted  it  to 
many  uses. 

In  one  form  and  another,  we  can  count  a  dozen 
rubber  articles  in  daily  use  by  us,  and  not  one 


MANY    OR    SPECIAL    PURPOSES  355 

could  be  made  to  serve  the  purpose  so  well  if  made 
by  any  other  material.  No  known  substance  has 
the  elasticity  of  rubber,  and  springs  back  to  its 
original  shape  when  tension  is  released.  No 
substitute  for  the  indispensible  rubber  band  is 
likely  to  appear. 

The  modern  rubber  industry  is  built,  however, 
upon  the  process  of  vulcanization,  which  hardens 
and  darkens  the  crude  caoutchouc,  reducing  its 
elasticity,  in  various  degrees,  according  to  the 
proportion  of  sulphur  added,  and  the  thoroughness 
of  their  union.  Vulcanite  is  the  name  given  to  the 
product.  It  is  not  so  sticky  as  pure  rubber,  it 
resists  ordinary  solvents,  and  changes  of  tempera- 
ture. It  is  adulterated  with  pigments  and  other 
mineral  substances.  The  colored  "rubber  goods" 
in  the  druggist's  window  illustrate  vulcanite  in 
modern  everyday  conveniences  of  the  household. 
Thirty  to  70  to  per  cent,  of  the  weight  of  rubber 
tires  of  vehicles  is  mineral  substance.  The  rubber 
plate  of  false  teeth  is  largely  coloring  matter. 

Ebonite  is  the  hardest  form  of  vulcanite,  black, 
brittle,  shiny.  We  buy  it  in  combs,  photographic 
trays,  and  in  the  insulation  of  electric  apparatus. 

The  invention  of  rubber  tires  for  vehicles  has 
given  the  rubber  market  a  tremendous  lift  within 
recent  years.  Automobiles  consume  the  greater 


356      THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

part  of  the  supply,  and  need  more  than  the  market 
can  furnish.  The  price  keeps  step  with  the  de- 
mand. The  cultivation  of  rubber  in  plantations 
has  been  started,  in  order  that  rubber  production 
may  be  put  on  a  scientific  basis,  and  the  yield 
increased. 

Legal  restrictions  now  prevent  the  abusive 
treatment  of  the  forests  of  rubber  trees.  They 
may  not  be  cut  down,  as  formerly  permitted,  and 
tapping  must  be  done  at  stated  intervals,  to  let  the 
trees  recuperate  from  the  exhaustion  they  suffer. 
At  present  the  simple  natives,  who  do  the  work  of 
gathering  crude  rubber,  are  under  the  control  of 
syndicates  which  have  concessions  from  the 
countries  in  which  the  trees  grow.  The  work  is 
hard  and  the  pay  small,  at  best;  but  cruel  treat- 
ment, even  atrocities,  have  been  committed  by 
overseers,  to  extort  more  wealth  for  the  company. 
The  African,  Peruvian,  and  Central  American 
forests  have  been  the  scenes  of  such  abuses. 
Investigations  that  have  given  publicity  to  the 
facts  will  doubtless  soon  lead  to  their  correction. 

Between  the  native,  who  gets  scant  pay  for 
crude  rubber,  and  the  consumer,  who  pays  an 
extravagant  price  for  one  tire  for  his  automobile, 
and  but  half  of  that  rubber,  there  is  a  tremendous 
profit  for  the  maker  and  the  seller.  No  wonder 


MANY   OR   SPECIAL   PURPOSES  357 

people  get  excited  on  the  subject  of  rubber  planta- 
tions, and  invest  recklessly  in  shares  in  such 
schemes,  for  the  suave  "promoter"  can  easily 
prove  that  there  is  money  made  in  the  rubber 
business. 

From  Brazil,  rubber  culture  has  spread  and 
become  established  in  all  important  countries  in 
the  Tropics.  Investigations  have  determined 
just  the  trees  and  other  plants  that  produce 
rubber  in  paying  quantities.  The  best  methods 
of  harvesting  the  crop  have  been  tested,  and  are 
being  established  to  replace  worn-out,  wasteful 
methods. 

Crude  rubber  is  the  coagulated  milky  juice  of 
several  trees,  chiefly  of  the  Euphorbia  tribe,  or 
family.  It  is  produced  in  a  network  of  passages 
that  lie  in  the  bark,  near  the  cambium,  or  liv- 
ing layer,  that  separates  wood  and  bark.  To  get 
the  fluid,  the  trees  are  tapped,  and  the  flow  led 
into  cups  that  are  emptied  at  regular  times,  and 
the  sap  treated,  without  delay,  to  hasten  the  coag- 
ulation of  the  caoutchouc,  and  to  evaporate  the 
watery  part. 

The  harvesting  of  rubber  has  in  late  years  inter- 
ested even  the  uncivilized  tribes,  now  the  slaves  of 
the  Rubber  Companies;  for  they  realized  that  it 
was  bad  business  to  abuse  or  kill  the  tree  that 


THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

produces  rubber.  To  get  the  greatest  quantity 
of  rubber  with  the  least  injury  to  the  tree  is  the 
modern  problem. 

The  oldest  method  of  tapping  was  to  cut  troughs 
down  the  four  sides  of  the  tree,  and  catch  in  some 
crude  way  the  flow  of  sap.  Then  the  plan  was  to 
cut  four  V's  as  high  as  the  reach  of  a  man  standing 
by  the  tree.  A  cup  was  fastened  at  the  point  of 
each.  Other  V's  cut  at  intervals  drained  the  area 
below.  This  overtaxed  the  trees. 

The  method  in  general  use  now  in  harvest- 
ing Para  rubber  is  the  herringbone  system.  A 
vertical  trough  is  cut  with  alternating  side  troughs, 
slanting  at  45  degrees  and  about  a  foot  apart. 
The  cup  set  at  the  base  of  the  main  trough 
catches  the  flow.  Each  day,  when  he  comes  to 
empty  the  cup,  the  collector  cuts  a  thin  slice  of 
bark  from  the  lower  edge  of  each  lateral  trough. 
This  opens  the  clogged  passages,  and  renews  the 
flow.  The  daily  cutting  is  repeated  until  the  side 
troughs  are  nearly  two  inches  wide,  or  until  de- 
crease in  the  flow  indicates  that  the  tree  is  drained. 
Six  months  of  rest  allows  the  tree  to  heal  its 
wounds,  and  reestablish  the  network  in  which  the 
milky  juice  is  found. 

The  spiral  system,  a  winding  trough  around  the 
trunk,  is  a  new  method,-  that  gets  the  greatest 


MANY   OR   SPECIAL   PURPOSES  359 

flow  of  sap.  Whether  it  is  best  for  the  tree  re- 
mains to  be  seen.  A  plan  to  prick  the  bark, 
puncturing  the  net-veins  but  not  going  deep 
enough  to  injure  the  cambium,  is  a  perfect  method; 
but  the  collecting  of  the  flow  is  the  difficulty. 
Such  treatment  would  not  hurt  the  trees,  if  done 
on  alternate  days.  It  might  go  on  for  years. 

Tapping  on  rainy  days  and  early  in  the  morning 
induce  the  greatest  flow,  for  the  heat  of  the  sun 
causes  the  juice  to  coagulate  and  stop  the  passages. 
Young  trees  and  trees  too  heavily  drained  yield 
rubber  of  poor  quality.  So  do  the  upper  parts 
of  trunks  and  the  limbs.  Thes£  facts  are  known 
to  the  greedy  rubber  gatherer,  and  it  saves  the 
tree  from  many  abuses. 

Para  rubber  comes  from  a  tree  called  Hevea 
Braziliensis,  that  grows  wild  in  different  parts  of 
the  silvas  of  the  Amazon,  and  in  Peru,  Bolivia, 
and  Guiana,  a  total  area  of  millions  of  square  miles. 
Para  is  the  port  from  which  most  of  it  is  shipped. 
Brazil  furnishes  the  world  about  half  of  its  rubber 
supply  —  exports  amount  to  fifty-four  million 
pounds  a  year.  Not  all  of  this  is  Para  quality. 

Because  Hevea  trees  produce  the  highest 
quality  of  rubber,  they  have  been  planted  where 
new  plantations  are  desired.  They  are  estab- 
lished in  the  West  Indies  and  Trinidad,  and  in 


360  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

Ceylon  and  the  Malay  Peninsula,  where  English 
companies  have  started  great  plantations.  Be- 
tween 1900  and  1910,  Para  rubber  rose  in  price 
from  three  shillings  to  twelve  shillings  per  pound ! 
It  costs  about  one  shilling  per  pound  to  collect 
from  the  wild  or  to  produce  in  plantations. 
The  price  fluctuates  in  the  hands  of  speculators, 
quite  independent  of  supply  and  demand. 

Central  American,  or  Panama  rubber  is  from  a 
tree  called  Castilloa  elastica,  which  grows  ten 
degrees  north  of  the  equator.  The  rubber  has  not 
the  strength  of  Para,  and  brings  a  lower  price.  It 
is  the  tree  of  Mexican  and  Honduras  plantations. 

A  tree  that  reaches  sixty  feet  in  height,  and 
yields  rubber  almost  equal  to  Para,  is  Sapium 
Jeumani,  that  grows  in  Colombia  and  Guiana. 
In  cultivation,  it  does  surprisingly  better  than  in 
the  wild. 

The  "India  rubber"  plant  of  the  northern 
greenhouses,  Ficus  elasticus,  is  the  Assam  rubber 
tree  in  its  East  Indian  forest  home.  It  may  begin 
life  as  an  air  plant,  fixing  its  roots  in  the  crotch  of 
another  tree  in  which  a  seed  has  lodged.  A  shock 
of  aerial  roots  strike  downward,  and  reach  the 
ground,  after  which  the  top  depends  upon  food 
drawn  from  the  earth,  and  the  supporting  host 
tree  is  no  longer  needed,  for  the  rubber  tree  by 


MANY  OR   SPECIAL   PURPOSES  361 

this  time  has  a  stiff  trunk,  and  is  able  to  stand 
alone. 

Assam  rubber  is  not  inferior  to  Para,  except 
that  it  is  not  so  carefully  gathered,  and  comes  dirty 
to  market.  The  mountain  trees  are  the  only  ones 
that  produce  first  quality  rubber. 

The  Silk  rubber  is  a  tree  sixty  or  seventy  feet  in 
height,  as  it  reaches  maturity  in  the  forests  of 
Africa.  It  crosses  the  central  part  of  the  conti- 
nent, from  east  to  west,  the  seeds  wafted  away 
on  the  long,  silky  filaments  that  give  the  tree  its 
name.  "Funtum"  the  natives  call  it,  and  the 
scientific  name  is  Funtumia  elastic  a.  The  trees 
are  tapped  by  the  herringbone  method,  the 
latex  (milky  juice),  collected  in  hollowed-out  logs, 
and  covered  with  palm  leaves.  The  water  is 
absorbed  by  the  porous  wood,  and  the  spongy 
rubber  that  remains  is  kneaded  into  balls  and  sent 
to  market. 

In  the  West  African  forests  the  natives  are 
practically  slaves  to  the  agents  of  the  company 
that  holds  the  concession  from  the  government 
that  rules  the  district.  King  Leopold  of  Belgium 
has  been  held  personally  responsible  for  much  of 
the  abuse  that  has  terrorized  the  blacks. 

Several  different  species  of  woody  climbers  of 
the  genus  Landolphia,  near  relatives  of  the 


362  THE    BOOK   OF    USEFUL    PLANTS 

Funtum  tree,  yield  rubber  when  tapped.  The 
latex  is  spread  out,  coagulates,  and  layer  on  layer, 
is  prepared  for  market.  The  old  method  was  to 
cut  down  the  vines  to  drain  their  juices.  As  they 
grow  on  forest  trees,  they  form  a  jungle  in  which 
it  is  difficult  to  collect  the  latex. 

The  rootstocks  of  certain  Landolphias  and 
other  plants,  and  the  tuberous  roots  of  the 
Guayule  plant  of  Mexico  and  the  Ecanda  plant  of 
West  Africa  yield  "root  rubber,"  which  is  ex- 
tracted by  breaking  them  up  in  hot  water,  and 
later  separating  the  waxy  rubber  from  the  residue. 

It  is  not  likely  that  these  plants  will  be  used 
when  the  growing  of  plantations  and  the  harvest- 
ing of  rubber  from  wild  forests  are  put  on  a  sound 
economic  basis. 

GUTTA    PERCHA 

"Getah  taban"  is  the  name  by  which  the 
native  of  the  Malay  Peninsula  calls  two  closely 
related  trees  that  he  taps  for  their  gray,  milky 
juice.  The  shamefully  wasteful,  primitive  method 
is  to  cut  down  the  tree,  strip  off  the  bark  in  rings, 
groove  the  wood  to  make  the  juice  flow,  and  boil 
the  fragments  of  wood  and  bark  to  get  all  the 
latex  possible.  It  is  the  residue,  after  the  water 


MANY   OR   SPECIAL    PURPOSES  363 

is  all  evaporated,  that  he  sells,  as  "gutta."  We 
call  this  solid  substance  "gutta  percha." 

The  peculiar  property  that  sets  gutta  percha 
apart  from  rubber  is  its  softening  in  warm  water, 
and  becoming  rigid  again  when  cooled.  It  is 
inelastic.  Otherwise  it  is  like  rubber. 

Gutta  percha  is  used  chiefly  to  insulate  wires  in 
electrical  apparatus.  The  laying  of  the  Atlantic 
cable  created  a  considerable  demand  for  it. 
Dentists  and  artists  prefer  it  to  other  substances 
for  taking  impressions.  It  is  one  of  the  materials 
used  for  the  handles  of  surgical  instruments,  and 
similar  articles. 

The  nearest  natural  substitute  for  genuine 
gutta  percha  is  made  from  the  juice  of  the  bullet 
tree,  a  near  relative  of  the  true  getah  taban.  It 
grows  in  Trinidad  and  South  America,  and  its 
juice,  while  containing  gutta,  is  about  half  resin, 
which  is  a  great  nuisance.  The  product  is  called 
Balata,  or  Surinam  gutta  percha. 

"Pontianac,"  made  from  the  juice  of  certain 
East  Indian  trees,  is  an  inferior  waterproofing 
material,  cheap  in  price,  for,  with  a  small  propor- 
tion of  gutta-like  substance,  it  contains  a  high 
percentage  of  resin  and  other  elements. 

The  five  species  of  true  gutta  percha  trees 
belong  to  the  genus  Dichopsis,  and  grow  only  on 


364  THE    BOOK   OF   USEFUL   PLANTS 

the  Malay  Peninsula,  or  near  it.  The  Balata,  or 
bullet  tree,  is  Mimusops  bullata,  whose  rich,  sweet 
fruit  is  found  regularly  in  the  West  Indian 
markets. 

MUSHROOMS 

The  decay  of  plants  keeps  the  surface  of  the 
earth  littered  with  debris  of  fallen  leaves  and 
branches,  and  underground  stems  and  roots. 
Swarms  of  microscopic  plants,  called  bacteria,  are 
at  work  reducing  the  tough,  woody  substances  to 
their  original  elements  —  making  vegetable  mold, 
upon  which  living  plants  can  subsist.  Earth- 
worms are  helping,  by  consuming  this  mold,  to 
mix  the  surface  mulch  with  the  mineral,  earthy 
soil  below.  They  are  the  natural  plows  that  re- 
duce clay  and  plant  mold  to  that  rich,  productive 
mixture  the  farmer  wants  —  a  live,  porous  loam. 

Among  the  other  plant  organisms  that  feed 
upon  the  broken  and  decaying  parts  of  dead  plants 
is  a  group  of  flowerless  plants  called  fungi.  They 
multiply  unseen,  in  the  moist  warmth  of  decaying 
roots,  under  the  bark  of  fallen  logs,  everywhere 
that  stored  plant  food  is  available.  Decaying 
plant  tissues  present  the  richest  possible  pasturage 
to  fungi. 

Finally,  when  their  bodies  are  fat  with  nourish- 


MANY  OR   SPECIAL   PURPOSES  365 

ment,  they  suddenly  turn  their  energies  to  fruiting. 
Out  of  the  ground,  or  out  of  some  pile  of  decaying 
wood,  a  grove  of  pallid  mushrooms  appears.  They 
come  up  in  a  night,  and  set  us  to  marvelling.  We 
have  not  seen  the  plants  themselves.  Tear  the 
bark  off  of  the  rotten  log,  and  there,  between  wood 
and  bark,  lie  the  pale  threads,  like  a  mass  of 
tangled  "yarn.  Without  the  weeks  of  growth  un- 
seen, no  mushrooms  could  have  been  formed. 

The  pink-gilled  meadow  mushroom,  whose 
cultivation  is  the  absorbing  occupation  of  many 
gardeners,  and  whose  search  takes  us  all  into  the 
fields  in  the  fall  of  the  year,  is  the  species  best 
known  as  a  food  plant.  The  fleshy,  cream-colored 
umbrella  is  hung  with  dull  pink  "gills,"  that  turn 
brown  in  a  short  time  after  the  "button"  opens 
into  the  umbrella.  Cut  a  fresh  one  from  the 
stem,  and  lay  it  on  a  sheet  of  white  paper.  Next 
morning  you  will  find  on  the  paper  a  pattern  of  the 
gills  made  by  a  fine  dust  that  has  fallen  from  each 
in  a  tiny  ridge.  A  breath  will  blur  the  distinct 
lines,  for  the  dust  is  impalpable,  almost.  These 
"spores"  are  to  the  mushroom  what  seeds  are  to 
the  higher  plants. 

The  claim  that  mushrooms  are  as  nutritious  as 
beefsteak  may  be  exaggerated.  Much  of  them  is 
water.  The  reason  they  are  good  food  is  that 


366       THE  BOOK  OF  USEFUL  PLANTS 

they  present  us,  in  a  new  form,  much  of  the  rich 
material  that  was  in  the  bodies  of  the  plants  whose 
decay  it  feeds  on. 

The  tall  "shaggy  manes,"  with  half-closed  um- 
brellas, and  roughened  surfaces,  belong  to  the 
ink-caps,  a  group  of  mushrooms  whose  spores  are 
not  scattered  by  wind,  as  the  powdery  ones  are, 
but  carried  off  in  an  inky  fluid,  into  which  the 
gills  seem  to  melt,  as  they  pass  their  prime.  They 
are  not  edible  after  the  gills  begin  to  darken. 

Some  of  the  gayest  mushrooms  are  not  fit  to 
eat;  a  few  of  the  pale  edible-looking  ones  are 
deadly  poison!  The  "destroying  angel,"  called 
the  "death  cup,"  also  grows  in  the  woods  among 
the  fine,  wholesome  kinds,  and  it  is  most  impor- 
tant to  let  all  mushrooms  alone,  unless  you  know, 
with  certainty,  the  edible  kinds  at  sight.  People 
who  do  not  know  the  good  from  the  bad  should 
not  collect  mushrooms,  and  rely  on  selecting  the 
good  ones  later  under  the  eye  of  a  competent  judge. 
The  poisonous  mushrooms  contaminate  those 
they  touch.  So  there  is  real  danger  in  taking  any 
chances. 

Pore-bearing  fungi  let  their  spores  escape  by 
minute  holes  in  the  under  surface  of  the  spongy 
umbrella,  or  bracket,  of  the  fruiting  body.  The 
huge  bracket  fungi,  of  dying  trees,  and  many  of  the 


MANY   OR   SPECIAL   PURPOSES  367 

brilliant  red  and  yellow  mushrooms  of  the  woods, 
belong  to  this  group. 

Puff-balls  are  fungi  of  globular  or  pear  shape, 
that  burst  on  ripening,  and  their  spores  escape 
like  a  cloud  of  snuff,  to  be  scattered  by  the  wind. 
In  the  cheesy  stage  these  fungi  are  good  to  eat. 
None  is  poisonous,  though  none  is  as  rich  in  flavor 
as  the  best  mushrooms. 

Many  people  grow  mushrooms  for  home  use  and 
for  market  in  cellars.  The  soil  is  made  by  mixing 
horse  manure  with  garden  loam,  and  planting  it 
with  mushroom  "spawn"  —  bits  of  the  dried 
mycelium,  or  thread-like  body  substance,  out  of 
which  the  umbrellas  rise.  Though  they  grow  in 
the  light  in  meadows,  these  mushrooms  are  happier 
as  "children  of  the  dark." 


THE  END 


INDEX 


INDEX 


Agua  miel,  288 
Alfalfa,  72 
Almonds,  104 
Apples,  207 
Apricots,  216 
Areca  palm,  297 
Argpl,  205 

Artichokes,  126,  174 
Asparagus,  129 

Bacteria,  364 
Bagasse,  82 
Bamboos,  333 
Bananas,  237 
Barbe  de  Capucin,  171 
Barley,  34 
Beans,  93 
Beeches,  114 
Beets,  159 
Berseem,  71 
Betel-nuts,  297 
Beverage  plants,  266 
Bhang,  323 
Blackberries,  218 
Blue-grass,  67 
Borecole,  148 
Brazil  nut,  116 
Bread-fruit,  56 
Bread  plants,  I 
Broccoli,  146 
Broom  corn,  327 
Brussels  sprouts,  145 
Buckwheat,  55 
Budding,  208 


Bumble-bees,  70 
Burbank,  219 
Bush  fruits,  220 
Butternut,  107 

Cabbage,  142 
Cacao,  267 
Caffeine,  286 
Cane  fruits,  218 
Canteloupe,  244 
Caprification,  235 
Carosella,  140 
Carrots,  177 
Cassaba,  245 
Cashew-nuts,  117 
Cassava,  62 
Cauliflower,  145 
Celeriac,  136 
Celery,  133 
Chard,  130 
Cheeses,  313 
Cherries,  217,  283 
Chervil,  141 
Chestnut  blight,  113 
Chestnuts,  112 
Chicory,  168 
Chiles,  259 
Chillies,  259 
Chinquapins,  114 
Chives,  152 
Chocolate,  272 
Citron,  199,  244 
Citrous  fruits,  195 
Clovers,  68 


372 


INDEX 


Cobnut,  116 
Coca,  298 
Cocoa,  268 
Coco-nuts,  337 
Codein,  297 
Coffee,  169,  279 
Coir,  326,  337 
Cola,  299 
Collards,  148 
Copra,  339 
Core  fruits,  206 
Corn,  36 

products,  42 

races  of,  38 

strains  of,  40 

varieties  of,  40 
Cotton,  310 

gin,  316 
Cowpeas,  95 
Cranberries,  220 
Cream  of  tartar,  205 
Cresses,  131 
Cross-fertilization,    25,    225, 

233 

Cucumbers,  260 
Currants,  202,  220 

Dandelion,  125 
Dewberry,  219 
Dextrine,  44 
Dill,  141 

Dragon's  blood,  337 
Durra,  51 

Ebonite,  355 
Eggplants,  256 
Endive,  124 
Ergot,  33 
Escarolle,  125 

Fennel,  139 
Fibre  plants,  300 


Figs,  230 

Filbert,  116 

Fine  herbs,  141 

Flax,  303 

Formalin  bath,  31,  33,   i°6 

Frijoles,  95 

Fungi,  364 

Garlic,  151 
Gherkins,  261,  263 
Glucose,  43 
Gluten,  15 
Goober,  100 
Gooseberries,  220 
Gourd,  247 
Grafting,  208 
Grapefruit,  200 
Grapes,  201 
Grass  Family,  67 
Hungarian,  54 
Grasses,  67 
Ground-nut,  101 
Gutta  Percha,  362 

Hasheesh,  324 
Hazelnuts,  116 
Hemp,  321,  241 

Manila,  324 
Henequen,  325 
Herba  Panacea,  292 
Hickories,  in 
Hops,  35,  344 
Horseradish,  164 

Jerusalem  artichoke,  174 
Jute,  326 

Kafir,  51 
Kohlrabi,  147 
Kola,  299 
Kumquats,  199 

Leeks,  152 


INDEX 


373 


Lemon,  199 
Lentils,  97 
Lettuce,  1 21 
Lime,  200 

Linen,  making  of,  309 
Lint,  311 
Loganberry,  219 
Loquats,  213 
Lucerne,  72 
Lupines,  97 

Mahiz,  40 
Maize  plant,  46 
Mallow  family,  313 
Maltose,  34 
Mandarins,  198 
Manioc,  62 
Mangel-wurzels,  160 
Manure,  green,  36 
Maranta,  60 
Marmelo,  21 1 
Marrows,  247 
Mate,  287 
Medlar,  212 
Melons,  241 
Millets,  53 
Milo,  52 
Molascuit,  82 
Morphine,  296 
Muskmelons,  244 
Mycelium,  367 
Mushrooms,  364 

Narcotics,  290 
Nectarines,  215 
Nigger-toes,  116 
Nitrogen,  68 
Nurse  trees,  269 

Oats,  27 

Oil  cake,  305 

Olives,  249 


Onions,  150 
Onion  sets,  154 
Opium,  296 
Orange,  195 

mandarin,  198 

varieties,  198 
Oyster  vegetable,  172 

Paddy,  II 
Pak-choi,  148 
Palms,  335 

sugar,  343 

date,  339 

ivory,  343 
Paprika,  259 
Papyrus,  68 
Para  nut,  116 
Parsley,  137 
Parsnips,  176 
Peaberries,  283 
Peaches,  214 
Peanuts,  98 
Pears,  210 
Pepo,  241,  260 
Peppers,  258 
Pe-tsai,  148 
Pieplant,   154 
Pina-cloth,  229 
Pineapples,  226 
Pisang^  239 
Pistachio  nuts,  117 
Phylloxera,  204 
Plants,  arrowroot,  59 

bread,  I 

holy,  6 
Plums,  213 
Pome,  207 
Pomelo,  200 
Pontianac,  363 
Popcorn,  38,  45 

types  of,  45 


374 

Poppy,  296 
Potato  beetles,  185 
Potatoes,  1 80 
Prunes,  214 
Puffballs,  367 
Pulque,  288 
Pumpkins,  246 

Queen  Anne's  lace,  178 
Quinces,  211 

Radishes,  162 
Raffia,  327 
Ramie,  325 
Raisins,  202,  206 
Rape,  347 
Raspberries,  218 
Ratoons,  80 
Rattan  palm,  341 
Red-top,  67 
Retting,  307 
Rhubarb,  154 
Rice,  3 

farming,  8 
Roots,  brace,  51 

feeding,  51 

Rotation  of  crops,  168 
Rubber,  44,  236,  352 
Rutabaga,  147 
Rye,  31 

Sago,  62 
Sake,  12 
Salsify,  172 
Scab,  186 
Scarlet  runner,  94 
Scullions,  150 
Sea-kale,  138 
Seedlings,  208 
Shallots,  151 
Silos,  44 
Sisal,  325 


INDEX 


Smut,  30 
Snuff-dipping,  295 
Spinach,  128 
Sport,  215 
Sorghum,  84 
Squashes,  246 
Stone  fruits,  213 
Stooling,  17,  72 
Strawberries,  222 
Succory,  1 68 
Sucrose,  82 
Sugar  beets,  85 

cane,  79 

maples,  88 

plants,  77 

Tangerines,  198 
Tannin,  278 
Tapioca,  62 
Tea,  273 

Teasel,  Fuller's,  349 
Teosinte,  39 
Theine,  278 
Theobroma,  268 
Theobromine,  272 
Timothy,  67 
Tillering,   17 
Tobacco,  291 
Tomatoes,  253 
Tubercles,  69 
Turnips,   147,  165 

Vetches,  97 
Vulcanite,  355 

Walnuts,  1 06 
Watermelons,  242 
Wheat,  14 

districts,  26 

farming,  15 

harvest,  20 
Witloof,  171 

Yam,  190,  191 


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